NEWSLETTER NO. 8, DECEMBER 1996:
In 1995 large-scale informal sector surveys in Dar es Salaam (Tanzania), Metro Manila (Philippines) and Bogota (Colombia) were carried out in cooperation with national statistical agencies.
The surveys were conducted in two phases as mixed household and enterprise surveys. This was considered the most appropriate survey method as the aims of the project were:
- to obtain for each city comprehensive data on the informal sector as a whole (including activities lacking recognizable business premises or conducted without fixed location) and the various segments it is composed of; and
- to analyze jointly, at the enterprise and household levels, the various informal sector activities undertaken by the same operators and households.
The survey samples were designed in a way which made it possible to analyze differences between various segments of the informal sector regarding their potential for employment and income generation, constraints and other characteristics.
The surveys in Dar es Salaam and Manila were designed as independent surveys based on samples specifically selected for the purposes of the project.
The survey in Bogota was designed as a subsample of the December 1994 round of the National House-hold Survey to which it was attached as a module. (For that purpose, the sample of the National Household Survey had been increased substantially in the Bogota area during the December 1994 round.)
Such differences in the design made it possible to compare the pros and cons of different survey methods for informal sector data collection.
For a better understanding of how informal sector activities function and how those involved behave, information was collected not only on facts, but also on reasons and preferences.
Some of the topics (e.g. occupational safety and health, social protection, (self-)organization) were novelties as they had never before been included in any large-scale informal sector survey.
Another novelty was that for the first time a subsample of the employees of informal sector operators were interviewed directly. The main purpose was to obtain information on the employees' personal characteristics, the conditions of their employment and work, and their social protection status and needs from the employees themselves, in addition to the information provided by their employers on the same topics. Some questions were also asked relating to topics for which only the employees themselves could provide information, such as their membership in workers' organizations, reasons for working in the informal sector, additional sources of income, and future plans regarding their work.
The surveys were undertaken either as the first part of a national informal sector survey or as a pilot for such a nation-wide survey which the national statistical agencies plan to complete or conduct on their own in the near future.
The experiences gained will also represent an important contribution to a technical manual on informal sector surveys which the Bureau will prepare following a request by the International Conference of Labour Statisticians.
Following the launching of the ILO/IPEC project on the "Elimination of Child Labour" in 1992, the main technical activities undertaken by STAT included the following:
- in close collaboration with national statistical offices in Ghana, India, Indonesia and Senegal, STAT designed and experimented methodological approaches for measuring statistically all forms of child labour through small sample surveys in selected urban and rural areas.
- assisted in preparing detailed individual country reports on the survey results, and conducted a one-week interregional seminar in Bangkok in August 1994 in which the national survey team leaders from the four countries above and senior statisticians and child labour specialists of IPEC-participating countries and UNICEF participated;
- produced a report on the findings of the surveys and on the conclusions and recommendations of the interregional seminar;
- produced and published a document entitled "Child Labour Surveys: Results of methodological experiments in four countries, 1992-93";
- provided technical advisory services and backstopping through missions and workshops, and conducting large-scale sample surveys of child labour in eight countries, seven of which are still ongoing.
INTERNATIONAL STANDARD CLASSIFICATION OF OCCUPATIONS (ISCO-88)
ISCO-88 is one of the main international standards for which the ILO (STAT) is responsible. The current version, ISCO-88, was adopted by the 14th International Conference of Labour Statisticians in 1987 and approved by the Governing Body in 1988. It is not easy to measure its success. Sixty-two countries have established links to ISCO-88 for their latest census results. Forty countries and territories have developed, or are in the process of developing, national occupational classifications based on ISCO-88 as a model, or on the same principles.
Technical support provided by STAT concerns both the development or revision of a national classification and the best methods for using it. For a country, this support ranges from answering written or oral questions to providing comments to drafts, as well as one or more advisory missions of one to two weeks to assist in preparing plans for the project or provide training, a study visit abroad for those working on the development of a national classification and the provision of a resident expert to supervise a project.
In addition to the ISCO-88 publication and diskettes mentioned below, useful ILO material on work with occupational classifications can be found in STAT Working Papers 1995/1 and 2 as well as in chapter 10 of Surveys on Economically Active Population, Employment,Unemployment and Underemployment and in chapters 22, 23 and 24 of Labour Statistics for a Market Economy.