IFPRI Discussion Paper No. 1049, December Andrew Dillon and Esteban J. Quinones (2010)

The study examines household asset dynamics and the asset inequality between genders in Northern Nigeria over the period 1988-2008.  The authors state that price fluctuations reinforced gender asset inequality within households.

Previous research has explored whether households can move out of poverty or are inhibited by their initial conditions. Asset stocks serve a key purpose in the way that they not only serve as a store of wealth and a means of production, but they also act as a buffer against unexpected shocks. This study examines firstly the role that initial household endowments may have in the future growth of such households. Secondly the authors attempt to study the role that such initial household endowments may have on men and women’s future intrahousehold possession of assets. The authors examine such household asset dynamics and gender-differentiated asset inequality over a period of 20 years from 1988 to 2008 in northern Nigeria.

In the analysis, two types of assets are considered – the value of household capital and livestock holdings. The first specification include per capita assets (capital or livestock) of a household in 1988 is defined as the dependent variable against factors such as per capita landholdings, any household shocks from 1989 to 2008 and a set of household characteristics like number of men, women and age and education of household head. A second specification is defined where the intrahousehold inequality of assets is investigated. The share of women’s assets in the households is defined as the dependent variable and estimated with the same factors as above. Survey data was collected in 1988 from four rural villages on 200 households in 1988 and from 576 households in 2008, which contained new households that split from the original households in 1988.

The authors reveal that in the 2008 survey, the households reported, as in 1988, that assets are held in the form of livestock, agricultural equipment and grains. The authors also disclose that different assets have different liquidity and productive uses. In the first set of results which only includes the sample of households originally surveyed in 1988, they find that the value of asset holdings in the form of livestock increased by 6,435 naira(NGN) over the 20 year period. Capital holdings also increased over this period by 350 NGN. Landholdings among the households did not vary that much between the two survey rounds. In the second set of results that compared the households surveyed in 1988 with the equivalent ones that formed in 2008, reveal that livestock and capital holdings increases are larger and more statistically significant. The authors also state that the households have maintained relatively constant landholdings between 1988 and 2008, implying that the land distribution pattern within the villages has been egalitarian. Furthermore, the researchers find that livestock holdings for split households have been constant over time, indicating that the intergenerational transfer of livestock between older and younger households over time may have taken place.

The researchers then publish results of the value of livestock and capital holdings in 2008 by gender. The results indicate that the values of the assets favored men more than women in both samples that included original and split households. The livestock value shares for males are higher than those for females but for capital value shares, females tend to have higher values. Other findings reveal that women whose households had initially high asset holdings maintain a similar share when compared to those women whose households had lower asset holdings to start out with in 1988. Furthermore, initial livestock holdings have a much larger effect on men’s future livestock holdings than on women’s holdings. The authors propose a few reasons as to why women’s livestock shares may not increase with higher holdings. Women hold their assets primarily in smaller and lower valued animals like poultry, compared to men who tend to possess larger, higher valued livestock like cows. The median price of higher valued livestock has increased more rapidly over the last 20 years which means that the livestock portfolios of men have increased more than women.

The authors also reveal some information on the transitions that households have made over time. It was found that sixty-one percent of the households who initially had a below average value of livestock holdings in 1988 still had low values of holdings in 2008. Fifty seven percent of households with above average value of livestock holdings had maintained their high values in 2008. This indicates that while there had been substantial movement in household asset holdings, there was less mobility among livestock holdings.

The paper concludes by offering some insights. The authors state that effective policy is required to reduce poverty, by increasing household access to productive capital and livestock for agricultural production. If the rates of asset growth among the poor are too slow, then policies are required to speed up the asset growth.

Finally, social protection programs to protect the assets of the poor are required, whether or not households are vulnerable to shocks.