Survey Report Traditional Practices in Malawi March 2019
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Survey Report Traditional Practices in Malawi March 2019 Authors Medson Makwemba | National Statistical Office of Malawi Blessings Chinsinga, Chrissie Thakwalakwa Kantukule, and Alister Munthali | Centre for Social Research, University of Malawi Mekonnen Woldegorgis l UNICEF Malawi Simon Haenni and Qingyang Lin, Center for Child Well-being and Development | University of Zurich supported by The 2018 Traditional Practices Study in Malawi was jointly implemented by the Center for Child Well- being and Development at the University of Zurich, the National Statistical Office of Malawi, the Centre for Social Research at the University of Malawi, and UNICEF Malawi. The authors would like to acknowl- edge funding from the UNICEF National Committee of Switzerland and the Excellence Foundation Zurich. The authors would like to thank all persons that made this study possible, in particular the valuable enu- merators, supervisors, drivers, and trainers that conducted the field work and diligent research assistants that helped in compiling this report. Disclaimer: The views expressed in this publication are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect those of UNICEF. The maps in this publication are stylized and not to scale. They do not reflect a position by UNICEF on the legal status of any country or territory or the delamination of any frontiers. Contents List of Figures 3 List of Tables 4 Executive Summary 7 Reading and understanding the survey report 15 1 Introduction 19 2 Methods 23 2.1 Sampling . 23 2.1.1 Objective . 23 2.1.2 Sampling Strategy . 23 2.1.3 Selection for Individual Interviews . 25 2.1.4 Response Rates . 25 2.2 Data Quality Measures . 26 2.2.1 Pilots and Pre-tests . 26 2.2.2 Survey Implementation . 26 2.2.3 Back Checks . 26 2.2.4 Social Desirability Bias . 27 3 Background Characteristics 29 3.1 Summary Statistics . 29 3.2 Household Characteristics . 29 3.2.1 Anthropological Background . 29 3.2.2 Income, Wealth, and Spending . 30 3.3 Individual’s Background . 32 3.3.1 Education . 32 3.3.2 Work and Employment . 32 4 Marriage / Union 43 4.1 Marital Status and Marriage Formation . 44 4.2 Marriage Age . 45 4.3 Reasons for Marriage / Cohabitation . 48 4.4 Decision Makers of Marriage / Cohabitation . 50 5 Initiation Rituals 57 5.1 Overall Prevalence of Initiation Rituals . 58 5.2 Activities at Initiation Rituals . 59 5.3 Positive Aspects About Initiation Rituals . 61 5.4 Decision Makers Behind in Initiation Rituals . 62 5.5 Reasons to Engage in Initiation Rituals . 63 5.6 Costs Related to Initiation Rituals . 63 5.7 Beneficiaries of Payments for Initiation Rituals . 64 5.8 Sexual Initiation Rituals . 64 5.9 The Fisi Tradition . 66 6 Conclusion 89 1 CONTENTS References 91 Appendix A Calculation of Sampling Weights 93 Appendix B Heterogeneity Tables 95 Appendix C Children’s Information 115 Appendix D Further Household Characteristics 123 D.1 Access to Media . 123 D.2 Water and Sanitation . 123 Appendix E Sexual Violence 129 Appendix F Sampling Errors 133 Appendix G Survey Instruments 179 2 List of Figures 4 Marriage / Union 4.1 Prevalence of child marriage across districts of Malawi . 46 4.2 Cumulative frequency of age at first marriage by region and gender. 47 4.3 Distribution of age at first marriage by gender. 47 4.4 Reasons for female marriage by marriage age. 49 4.5 Decision makers behind female marriage by marriage age. 52 5 Initiation Rituals 5.1 Overall prevalence of initiation rituals . 58 5.2 Content at girls initiation rituals by region . 60 5.3 Decision makers behind initiation rituals by region . 62 5.4 Prevalence of sexual initiation rituals across districts of Malawi . 65 5.5 Sexual content at girls initiation rituals by region . 66 5.6 Prevalence of critical sexual initiation rituals across districts of Malawi . 67 3 List of Tables 2 Methods 2.1 Distribution of Sampled Clusters . 24 2.2 Underlying assumptions for power calculations . 25 2.3 Responses by Questionnaires . 26 3 Background Characteristics 3.1 Summary Statistics . 34 3.2 Religious denomination of household heads . 34 3.3 Ethnic groups of household heads . 34 3.4 Lineality . 35 3.5 Locality . 35 3.6 Bride price . 35 3.7 Dowry ................................................. 36 3.8 Main source of the household income . 36 3.9 Value of weekly household food consumption . 36 3.10 Value of weekly household non-food consumption . 37 3.11 Main materials of the wall of the dwelling . 37 3.12 Main materials of the roof of the dwelling . 37 3.13 Main materials of the floor of the dwelling . 38 3.14 Ownership of household items by household members . 38 3.15 Ownership of dwellings . 38 3.16 Ownership of agricultural land . 38 3.17 Average area of owned agricultural land . 39 3.18 Average area of rented agricultural land . 39 3.19 Financial constraints due to natural disasters . 39 3.20 Women’s education background . 39 3.21 Men’s education background . 40 3.22 Last time to attend school for women . 40 3.23 Last time to attend school for men . 40 3.24 Reason of ending education for women . 41 3.25 Reasons of ending education for men . 41 3.26 Labour force participation . 41 3.27 First time of employment for women . 42 3.28 First time of employment for men . 42 4 Marriage / Union 4.1 Marital status . 52 4.2 Formation of marriage / partnership . 53 4.3 Age at first marriage / cohabitation . 53 4.4 Percentage of child marriage for females and males . 53 4.5 Current Age of partner . 53 4.6 First partners’ age at marriage / starting cohabitation . 54 4.7 Right age of marriage for both genders . 54 4.8 Reasons for marriage / cohabitation . 54 4.9 Decision makers of marriage / cohabitation . 55 4 LIST OF TABLES 5 Initiation Rituals 5.1 Prevalence of girls’ initiation rituals . ..