Household Headship, Vulnerability, and Migration in Deltas in Africa and Asia

Mumuni Abu , University of Ghana

There has been a rising interest in studies on household-headship because of the increasing proportion of female-headship. Studies in developing countries suggest that a substantial proportion of households in rural areas are headed by females and such households tend to have fewer resources to invest in their livelihoods. Migration has been identified as one of the contributing factors to the increasing number of female-headed households. However, none of these studies have examined how exposure to different hazard levels affect migration under different household-headships. Deltas are vulnerable to climate change and other environmental hazards and the proportion of female-headship in deltas is higher than national averages. Using data from DECCMA household surveys, we hypothesise that female-headed households when exposed to different environmental hazard levels are more likely to have migrant members compared to other household-headships. Our findings illustrate the role of household-headship in the context of migration in hazard prone areas.

See extended abstract

 Presented in Session 7. Migration & Urbanization