Morocco (3):

1.Title of the survey:

National Survey of the rural economically active population (Enquête nationale sur la population active rurale - ENPAR).

2.Organization responsible for the survey:

Directorate of Statistics, Ministry of Planning (Direction de la statistique, ministère du Plan).

3.Coverage of the survey:

(a) Geographical:

(b) Persons covered:

Excluded from the coverage of the survey are persons resident in collective households (military barracks, philanthropic institutions, places of detention, etc.) and non-residents. However, students in halls of residence and boarding schools are considered as members of the households surveyed.

4.Periodicity of the survey:

The survey is to take place every three years. The first survey was conducted from 1 July 1986 to 30 June 1987. The next is planned for 1990/1991.

5.Reference period:

The day before the interview, or the week or month preceding the interview, according to the category of questions.

6.Topics covered:

The survey provides information on employment, unemployment, underemployment, hours of work, wages, duration of unemployment, regularity of employment (permanent, occasional or seasonal workers), industry, occupation, status in employment and level of education.

7.Concepts and definitions:

(a) Employment:

1. "The employed in the narrow sense of the term, i.e. all persons aged 7 years and over who spontaneously stated that they had a job at the time of the survey. Two categories of employed persons are distinguished:
   1. employed persons present at their work at the time of the survey;
   2. employed persons who were absent from their work at the time of the survey, who have a job but did not work at it during the reference period (the day prior to the date of the survey), for temporary reasons beyond their control, such as illness, leave, or temporary suspension of activity; these persons have a formal attachment with their work and intend to return to it within two months.

2. The marginal employed population, i.e. all persons aged 7 years and over who consider themselves as inactive but state, at an advanced stage of the interview, that they had an economic activity during the reference period (the 30 days preceding the date of the survey)."

The concept of marginal employed population provides in particular fuller information on the employment of women living in rural areas, who do not readily admit to employment. These women are therefore asked to describe in detail how they spent their time during the reference period, and with the aid of a nomenclature of rural economic activities the woman is classified either as a member of the economically active population or as inactive.

The employed population also includes:

1. full- and part-time workers seeking other work;
2. persons who did any work for pay or profit during the reference period (the day or the month preceding the interview), while being retired and receiving a pension;
3. paid or unpaid apprentices and trainees;
4. participants in employment promotion schemes;
5. paid or unpaid family workers, even when temporarily absent from their work;
6. private domestic servants;
7. members of producers' co-operatives, if they work in the co-operative;
8. volunteer and career members of the armed forces (excluding conscripts, who are not covered by the survey) and persons doing civilian service, who are graduates from higher educational establishments and receive a remuneration.

Excluded from the employed are:

1. persons doing community work or unpaid social work;
2. pupils or students whose main activity is attendance at an educational institution;
3. persons whose only activity is work around the house (case of housewives).

(b) Underemployment:

(c) Unemployment:

1. "The unemployed population in the narrow sense of the term, i.e. all individuals aged 15 years and over who are not working (i.e. have no job) at the time of the survey and spontaneously state that they are looking for a job. Persons surveyed who are not looking for work because they have been promised employment or are awaiting a reply from an employer or the takeoff of their own business, or for any temporary reason, are also considered as unemployed;

2. The marginal unemployed population, i.e. all persons surveyed aged 15 years and over who spontaneously consider themselves as inactive but state at an advanced stage of the survey that they are looking for work."

Included among the unemployed are:

1. persons laid off temporarily or for an indefinite period without pay;
2. persons without a job and immediately available for work, who have made arrangements to work in a new job at a date subsequent to the date of the interview (within a period not exceeding two months);
3. seasonal workers awaiting (agricultural or other) seasonal work.

(d) Hours of work:

(e) Informal sector:

(f) Usual activity:

8.Classifications used:

The whole of the economically active population is classified by industry, main occupation and status in main employment. All persons covered by the survey are classified according to their level of education, and persons aged 10 years and over are classified according to the highest diploma obtained.

(a) Industry:

A ten-group classification has been adopted, which is convertible to the International Standard Industrial Classification of all Economic Activities (ISIC-1968) at the 3-digit level.

Information is also collected on the sector in which the person works at the time of the survey, and four classification groups have been adopted:

1. agricultural sector only,
2. non-agricultural sector only,
3. agricultural and non-agricultural sectors,
4. unemployed: for persons unemployed at the time of the survey.

"All work linked directly to agriculture, forestry, hunting, stockbreeding and fishing, is considered as work in the agricultural sector". Any other work is considered as work in the non-agricultural sector.

(b) Occupation:

An eight-group classification has been adopted, which is convertible to the International Standard Classification of Occupations (ISCO-1968).

(c) Status in employment:

1. Self-employed,
2. Employer,
3. Employee,
4. Home worker,
5. Apprentice,
6. Unpaid family worker.

This classification is convertible to the International Classification of Status in Employment (ICSE).

(d) Level of education/qualifications:

1. No diploma,
2. Certificate of primary education,
3. Certificate of secondary education, higher education, or occupational skills and training,
4. Not stated.

9.Sample size and design:

(a) The sample frame:

(b) The sample:

At the first of these stages, 50 per cent of the primary units of the master sample were selected. At the second stage, three clusters averaging 25 households each were chosen from each of the primary units selected. Thus nearly 16,200 households were observed (4,050 quarterly), i.e. about 100,000 persons. The final sampling fraction is about 1 per cent.

(c) Rotation:

10.Field work:

(a) Data collection:

The method used for the survey is the direct method. When interviewing a household the interviewer fills in a questionnaire with the help of the instructions prepared for that purpose, and interviews a little more than six households, on average, daily. The questionnaire is pre-codified, and the interviewers directly code the replies given by the persons surveyed, except the replies requiring the use of a nomenclature (occupation, economic activity and highest diploma obtained). The survey took the whole year from 1 July 1986 to 30 June 1987. The files on the final units surveyed are sent every month to the Compilation Centre at the Directorate of Statistics.

(b) Substitution of ultimate sampling units:

11.Quality controls:

Completed questionnaires are checked on the spot by the supervisors when information is collected. In case of error or omission, the interviewer who filled in the questionnaire sees the household again. Questionnaires are then checked in detail by the regional offices, and errors and omissions found are corrected by re-interview. When the Compilation Centre is sent the questionnaires it checks the quality of the information collected and codes the questions on occupation, economic activity and diplomas.

After coding, the questionnaires are sent to the Computer Division for data capture and computer processing, and undergo tests for accuracy and coherence. They are analysed by a team of computer experts and statisticians from the Household Surveys Division. The principle of automatic correction (by programme) has been adopted for auditing the files, in order to reduce the time required for analysis of the survey data.

12.Weighting the sample:

Weighting and adjustment of the survey results are in two stages. The first consists in adjusting the basic extrapolation coefficients in order to reduce the distorsions that may be caused by non-response. The adjustment is by region. Its principle consists in multiplying the basic extrapolation coefficients by (1 + Xn), where Xn is the ratio of non-respondent households to the total number of households surveyed (including non-respondent households).

The second stage consists in rendering the population estimates shown by the survey consistent with those of the population projections. The auxiliary information used in correcting the weighting coefficients is the breakdown of the population by sex and by age. The data shown by the survey are compared with the population projections. The weights of all the persons surveyed within a class are corrected by the same multiplying factor (the factor varying from class to class) so that the structures by sex and by age shown by the survey are consistent with those of the population projections.

13.Sampling errors:

Sampling errors are calculated for internal use only, and are not published.

14.Adjustments:

(a) Population not covered:

(b) Under/overcoverage:

(c) Non-response:

Adjustment for non-response is made when results are extrapolated. The crux of the correction procedure is to increase the weights of respondent households so that they represent the non-respondent households.

15.Seasonal adjustment:

Breakdown of the sample into quarterly subsamples shows the effect of the seasonal character of rural economic activity on the rural labour market.

16.Non-sampling errors:

Non-sampling errors are negligible, due to the controls made at various stages of the survey.

17.History of the survey:

The 1986/87 survey is the first ad hoc survey in Morocco of the rural economically active population. A second survey is to be made in 1990/91.

18.Documentation:

The reports published on this survey are the synthesis report and the report of detailed results. For data and methodological information, see:

Ministère du Plan, Direction de la statistique: "Enquêtes statistiques, Population active rurale 1986/1987, Vol. I: Rapport de Synthèse" (Rabat, 1988).

Other unpublished results in the form of tables and magnetic tapes are also available, on application to the Directorate of Statistics.