Construction of household asset-based wealth index for Eastern region, Kenya

Abstract

There are growing concerns regarding inequities in health, with poverty being an important determinant of health as well as a product of health status. Within Eastern region Kenya, disparities in socio-economic position are apparent, with the rural-urban gap of particular concern. The aim of this study was to construct a wealth index for Eastern region Kenya to establish areas of inequalities in resource distribution. The researcher used data from Kenya Demographic and Health Survey (KDHS) 2008. This data was on ownership of household durable assets, housing characteristics, and utility and sanitation variables in both rural and urban regions. Principal components analysis (PCA) was employed to generate household asset-based proxy indices. Household were grouped into quintiles, from wealthiest to the poorest. Estimation of wealth index and wealth quintiles of a population in this study did not differ, if the population was first split into rural and urban sampled populations with estimating the wealth index for the entire sampled population. This study concluded that proxy measures, as compared to direct measures of determining wealth are a reliable method. The wealth index findings in this study were in agreement with UNDP findings on poverty levels in Eastern region (40.8%)