Baseline Report for the Millennium Challenge Account’s Alatona Irrigation Project February 2011 Lori Beaman1 Andrew Dillon2 Aissatou Ouedraogo3 Wahid Quabili4 1. Northwestern University, Innovations for Poverty Action 2. International Food Policy Research Institute 3. Innovations for Poverty Action 4. International Food Policy Research Institute Alatona Irrigation Project Baseline Report Executive Summary The main objective of this report is describe some of the rich set of information on characteristics of individuals, households and villages in the Alatona zone, plus comparable information from nearby villages, attained in the baseline survey of 2008-2009. This baseline report also outlines the overall design of Alatona Irrigation Project, the evaluation strategy proposed to estimate the project’s impacts on beneficiaries, and provides details on the methodology used for data collection, including the sampling strategy and the questionnaire development. A reader most interested in the contents of the data can skip to section Community Descriptive Statistics. While the main focus of the report is the description of individuals, households and villages in the Alatona zone, we also include statistics on individuals, households and villages in nearby villages with irrigation (irrigated villages) and without irrigation (non-irrigated villages). The motivation for collecting information outside of the Alatona stems from the overall evaluation strategy explained in the report. The purpose of including the statistics from the irrigated and non-irrigated villages in this report provides a way to frame the statistics about the Alatona zone. This way we can gain insights into the zone both in absolute terms but also relative to nearby geographic areas. As the Alatona Irrigation Project’s primary objective is to increase agricultural production and reduce poverty, we note the striking differences that comes out of the data between Alatona households and those in the rest of the sample is in terms of agricultural production. There is very little agricultural output, of any crop, in the Alatona villages. These differences in production are driven by fewer hectares cultivated, since Alatona households cultivated an average of 0.35 hectares, while the irrigated and non-irrigated households cultivated 2 and 2.6 hectares, respectively. Differences between the irrigated villages and the Alatona are driven primarily by rice production; 5.2 tons per hectare in irrigated households in contrast to the 319 kilograms which are produced per hectare in the Alatona. When we examine agricultural income derived from crop sales, households in the Alatona received 30,537 FCFA during the 2008/2009 agricultural season while households in irrigated villages and non-irrigated villages generated 408,595 FCFA and 150,376 FCFA in agricultural revenue. Differences in access to water and toilet facilities are equally striking as differences in agricultural production. Thirty-one percent of Alatona households used improved deep wells (boreholes), while villages outside of the Alatona had a higher level of access to improved deep wells, with 64 percent and 44 percent having access in irrigated and non-irrigated comparison households, respectively. Stark differences in toilet facilities are also present comparing the Alatona villages to the irrigated and non-irrigated villages. Sixty-four percent of Alatona Innovations for Poverty Action i Alatona Irrigation Project Baseline Report households have no toilet or latrine facilities and use the outside environment to evacuate human waste. Only 4-8 percent of households in the comparison group had no toilet or latrine facility. Households in the Alatona also differ from households in the irrigated and non-irrigated villages in levels of human capital. Among the most striking statistics from the baseline data is the level of education among adults in the sample and current child enrollment. In irrigated villages, 25 percent of men had completed some education, while only 10 and 1.6 percent of men in the non- irrigated villages and the Alatona, respectively, had completed any education. Women from the irrigated areas had the highest levels of educational attainment with 10 percent having some education, while women in non-irrigated comparison villages had only a 2.8 percent educational achievement rate. Only 1.2 percent of women in the Alatona villages had any schooling. When we consider the educational participation rate of school-age children, we find the same pattern for children as we find for adults. 50 percent of boys in irrigated areas were currently enrolled while 41 percent of all girls of school age where enrolled. In comparison, 38 percent of boys and 24 percent of girls from non-irrigated comparison villages were enrolled. In the Alatona villages, 3 and 1.5 percent of boys and girls were enrolled. These statistics are striking as they suggest for both adults and children in the Alatona villages a persistent lack of access to school. They also suggest strong differences in investments in education made by households for boys relative to girls. This suggests that the Alatona Irrigation Project, in creating new communities and building schools to increase access to education, should also emphasize the importance of equal access to education. The data also reveal interesting patterns in asset ownership. In the Alatona, women hold more assets than men do, but hold fewer assets than women in either the irrigated or non-irrigated villages. As total asset ownership among households in the Alatona is quite low, household durables - such as cooking materials and other household objects - are likely held by women, whereas men may hold fewer of these types of durable assets when households are poor. The value of assets held by women is also higher than the value of assets held by men in the Alatona. In the villages outside of the Alatona, we observe the same pattern that women own more assets than men; however, men have higher-valued assets than women have. Livestock, which is an additional form of assets but reported separately as livestock holding is of interest in its own right, shows the opposite trend. Both in terms of tropical livestock units and value of livestock, men have higher livestock holdings and values of these holdings than women. Most striking among all these asset comparisons is the high level of livestock holdings and value among men in the Alatona villages. These holdings are almost four times those reported by households in the irrigated and non-irrigated villages. Changes in livestock holdings over time, both in the Alatona and outside, will be of interest in the evaluation of the AIP. Innovations for Poverty Action ii Alatona Irrigation Project Baseline Report These differences between the Alatona and households found in irrigated and non-irrigated villages are investigated in the report to highlight the attention that should be placed on some of these striking statistics in the final evaluation. The report covers additional information on numerous village characteristics, such as access to infrastructure, credit and health services, and on household and individual characteristics, including food and non-food expenditure, housing conditions, use of agricultural inputs and agricultural capital. Innovations for Poverty Action iii Alatona Irrigation Project Baseline Report Acknowledgements The authors would like to thank the tireless efforts of the Millennium Challenge Account- Mali and the Millennium Challenge Corporation. We have especially benefitted from interactions and insights from Madeleine Gauthier, Annette Richter, Tigana Kalilou, Abou I. Diawara, and Cheick Aliou Soumare, among many others. Nouhoum Traore provided excellent research assistance during his time at Innovations for Poverty Action-Mali. We appreciate the assistance of the Office du Niger and many staff members who assisted us in the formative stages of this research. The Environment and Social Development Company (ESDCO) conducted the fieldwork to collect the baseline data. The Centre d’Appui à la Recherche et à la Formation (CAREF) provided technical assistance with data entry and verification. Most importantly, we appreciate the cooperation and patience of survey respondents and community leaders who provided the information reported in this document and welcomed us with the finest forms of Malian hospitality. Innovations for Poverty Action iv Alatona Irrigation Project Baseline Report Acronyms and Abbreviations AIP Alatona Irrigation Project CAREF Centre d’Appui à la Recherche et à la Formation ESDCO Environment and Social Development IFPRI International Food Policy Research Institute IPA Innovations for Poverty Action MCA-Mali Millennium Challenge Account-Mali MCC Millennium Challenge Corporation ON Office du Niger PAP Project Affected People Innovations for Poverty Action v Alatona Irrigation Project Baseline Report Table of Contents Introduction ................................................................................................................................................... 1 Brief Overview of the Alatona Irrigation Project ......................................................................................... 2 Objectives of the Baseline Survey ................................................................................................................ 4 Review of the Evaluation Design .................................................................................................................