| Abstract |
The 2006 Integrated Labour Force Survey (ILFS) was designed to generate labour market information to meet the socio economic demands of the country as articulated in the Zanzibar long-term plan (Vision 2020). It was further aimed at providing data for use in the monitoring and evaluation of the Zanzibar Strategy for Growth and Reduction of Poverty (ZSGRP) as well as the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).
The ILFS was a comprehensive survey the first of its kind and had four modules namely; Labour Force, Informal Sector, Child Labour and Time Use1. The survey covered 5,600 representative sample households; 3,392 and 2,208 households from rural and urban areas respectively.
The survey was specifically designed to generate reliable information on employment, unemployment, informal sector and in depth information on child labour. Information on economic activity status of the target population was collected on all persons, the analyses and results focused on persons aged 15 years and above. In order capture seasonal variations (throughout the year 2006), data was collected on quarterly basis. The measurements were based on both short term-interval of one week prior to the interview (currently economic activities) and long term interval of twelve months.
Key findings of the Survey are as follows:-
Demographic, Household Characteristics and Income
The results of the survey reveal that the estimated population of Zanzibar, in 2006, was at 1.1 million people, out of whom 40.8 percent lived in urban areas. The population's median age was 17 years, depicting a very young population with 43.4 percent of the population is below age 15 years.
The national average size of the household is 5.2 persons, where the average size is 5.1 and 5.3 persons for rural and urban areas respectively. One in every five households (21.0 percent) is female headed.
About one third (31.2 percent) of the heads of household have no education. The number of heads of household with no education is higher in rural areas by 42.4 percent. Furthermore, women with no education in rural areas registered 67.8 percent.
The construction material for household dwellings indicated that 67.4 percent of all housing units are roofed with metal sheets; urban areas constitute 83.9 percent and rural areas 56.4 percent. Two- fifths of households were roofed with grass. In urban areas, three out of four dwellings used cement bricks for construction while 56.6 percent of rural housing used wooden poles and mud.
Firewood and charcoal (fuel wood) were found to be the main sources of energy for cooking accounting for 68.7 and 29.0 percent respectively. The households' drinking water comes from different sources; more than three quarters (75.9 percent) of the households depend on piped water and unprotected wells account for 14 percent.
Traditional pit-latrine is the modal toilet facility found in about one half (49.7 percent) of all households. A significant proportion of households (30.5 percent) have no toilet facility at all. Flush toilets are more common in the urban areas.
More than one half (58.0 percent) of the rural surveyed households were found to depend solely on agriculture while four fifths of the urban households are dependent on remunerations as the main source of income.
Currently Active Population (the Labour Force)
The currently active population or the labour force comprises all persons aged 15 years and above who, during one week prior to the ILFS field data collection date, fulfill the requirements for inclusion among the employed or the unemployed, which together form the Labour Force.
A total of 513,032 (aged 15+ years) persons were found to be currently economically active out of the total working population of 614,987 people. Majority of them (308,436 people )equivalent to 60.1 percent were found in the rural areas compared with (204,596 people) or 39.9 percent found in the urban areas.
Looking at currently employed persons, the results show that male employees dominate making up 51.5 percent and females 48.5 percent. Rural areas have 303,402 (62.6 percent) of the total currently employed persons while urban areas account for 181,178 (37.4 percent). Out of the total, urban areas have 54.5 percent male and 45.5 female currently employed persons, whilst rural areas have 49.8 percent male and 50.2 percent female currently employed persons.
The overall participation rate is 83.7 percent with males exhibiting higher than average rate of 86.8 percent and females 80.8 percent. Participation rate peaks at age group 45-49 for males and 40-44 for females, even when males are observed to enter the labour market earlier and in big numbers.
Unemployment
Unemployment rate is the ratio of the number of unemployed persons to the labour force expressed as percentage. The unemployed is defined as all persons of 15 years of age and above who during the reference week were "without work, available for work and seeking work."
A total of 28,451 persons out of 614,986 working age population (4.6 percent) were found to be unemployed; 17.7 and 82.3 percent in rural and urban areas respectively.
The overall unemployment rate is 5.5 percent i.e. out of the total labour force 5.5 percent were unemployed. In rural areas, the unemployment rate is 1.6 percent compared to 11.4 per cent in the urban areas. The age groups that experienced the highest unemployment rate were 20-24 years with 13.0 percent (more than double the average) followed by age group 25-29 years
.
Underemployment
Workers are classified as underemployed if they are willing and able to change their work situation in order to, for example, work additional hours, or use their skills better, or increase their income per hour, or work in an establishment with higher productivity etc. regardless of the duration or productivity of their currently
employment situation.
A total of 60,553 persons were found to be underemployed. Most (60.5 per cent) of the underemployed persons fall under ages 15-34 years, led by the age group 20-24, which alone have 18.9 percent of the total currently underemployment. In urban areas, persons aged 15 - 34 years make 64.4 percent. Rural areas lead having 60.0 percent of the total currently underemployment, of whom 32.8 percent were rural male alone. Generally, underemployment is dominated by persons who have attained O-level education and below. Half of the rural underemployed persons are those engaged as unpaid family helpers in agricultural activities (50.0 percent). Rural males take the leading position having 59.7 percent and females 38.3 percent.
Employment-related Income
Employment-related income consists of the payments, in cash, in kind or services, which are received by individuals, for themselves or in respect of their family members, as a result of their current or former involvement in paid or selfemployment.
The mean employment related income received by the paid employees was Tsh 67,809.8 which is lower compared with the mean income received by the self employed persons (Tsh 83,901.3). The same pattern was observed for the median income for the paid employees that stood at Tsh 50, 000 compared with Tsh 70, 000 for the self employment. The results further reveal that the income received by the paid employees has lower variation compared to that received from self employment.
Employment in the Informal sector
It was found that a total of 144,147 persons were engaged in informal sector; majority (45.4 percent) in the age groups 20-34. In rural areas, the informal sector was more dominated by persons with age group 15-19 accounting for 18.0 percent, while in urban areas 16.9 percent were found in the age group 30-34.
Nine out of every ten persons (92.5 per cent) in the informal sector were engaged as self-employed, about 5.4 per cent engaged as paid employees and a small proportion (2.1 per cent) engaged as unpaid family workers.
Overall, about a half (44.9 percent) of the informal sector enterprises are found in two locations namely; within own or business partner's home-with special business and within own or business partner's home-without special business. On whether informal sector operators have access to credit/loans, it was found that nine out of ten (91.9 per cent) operators have never received a loan. More females have received loans (10.2 percent) compared with males (6.3 percent). It is only 8.1 percent of the persons engaged in the informal sector who have received loan and these were mainly from friends and relatives.
Youth Employment (persons aged 15-24)
The total youth population of Zanzibar is estimated at 219,824 persons whereas the rural areas account for 56.2 percent. Less than half (44.9 percent) of the young people have attained lower secondary education and only 0.1 percent had attained their tertiary non university level education.
The currently unemployed population of youth in the age groups 15 to 24 by geographical area reveals that 3,259 unemployed youth (25.0 percent) are in the rural areas and 9,767 (75.0 percent) are in urban areas.
More young women (69.5 percent) than young men (30.5 percent) are unemployed and this is consistent in all the age groups but is significantly larger for the 20 to 24 age group.
The total unemployment rate for young people aged 15 to 24 is 8.7 percent. The male unemployment rate in the urban areas is 11.7 percent, which is higher than in the rural areas, with a rate of 1.7 percent. The female unemployment rate of 23.7 percent in the urban areas is higher compared with 5.1 in the rural areas. The unemployment rate is highest (13 percent) for young people in the age group 20 to 24.
Working children and their conditions
The total number of currently employed children aged 5-17 years were 115,963; males accounted for 59,245 (51.0 percent) and females 56,718 (49.9 percent). The majority of the currently employed children was aged 12-14 years and marked 41,663 (35.9 percent) of the total, most of whom males 21,705 (36.6 percent). Out of total estimated 115,963 employed children, 75.1 percent have attained primary education, followed by 9.9 percent who have had no education and 6.1 percent who attained pre-school education.
Majority (55.5 percent) of the children reported to be working is engaged as unpaid family workers (in-agriculture) followed by those in their own farm or shamba (18.8 percent) and only (1.5 percent) of working children are paid employees.
In urban areas, 30,113 (80.6 percent) of employed children work as unpaid family helpers (non agriculture) followed by 3,363 (9.0 percent) as self-employees. Small proportion 251 children (0.7 percent) of employed children work as unpaid family helpers (in agriculture).
In rural areas, 34,230 (43.6 percent) of employed children work as (unpaid family helpers (non agriculture), 19,171 (24.4 percent) work on their family farms or shamba and 739 (0.9 percent)of working children work as paid employees. It was noted that in urban areas, the number of children working as paid employees is 992 (2.7 percent) whereas in rural areas it is 739 (0.9 percent)
The main activity in which children are involved is fetching water for home use, accounting for 47,780 (41.2 percent) of the working children, 29,892 (25.8 percent) engaged in agriculture, hunting and forestry and 290 (0.3 percent) found in construction.
As for the reasons, about 43,531 (39.3 percent) of working children work to assist in household enterprise, 32,551 (29.4 percent) to get good upbringing and acquisition of skills and 20,942(18.9 percent) of children reported working are engaged in labour so as to supplement household income. |
