#ms06: Income

Income is a factor that influences access to food, meaning that it also impacts the underlying causes of malnutrition, according to the WHH SFNS approach. Cash income affects a household’s ability to obtain the food necessary for a sufficiently diverse diet and to thereby achieve sustainable food and nutrition security. Income also plays a role in overall wellbeing. Increases in income have been shown to correlate with improvements in other dimensions of wellbeing, such as health, nutrition, life expectancy, and educational achievements. The income indicator is useful to assess the success of interventions intending to increase income.

The #ms Income indicator assesses the number of households that report a higher income than before project implementation.

Collect the following data by conducting individual interviews with a representative sample (WHH sampling guidelines) of the households targeted in your project.

Questions should be addressed to the household head or a person responsible for or aware of the care and organization of the household. This is often, though not necessarily, the person providing the main source of income for the household.

• More information: #ms06 Income Handbook (EN)

Disaggregate the data by age, gender, wealth, disability, location and other relevant criteria.

This is a 'Measuring Success' (#ms) indicator. It is obligatory for all WHH projects to integrate all #ms indicators that align with the project context, with a minimum requirement of utilizing at least one indicator (and implementing one #ms qualitative tool).

1) Because this indicator asks directly about a self-perceived change in income, it does not require a baseline value. It should therefore be collected as part of an endline survey. It may also be used for interim/ midline surveys but is not suitable for baseline surveys.

2) Data for the #ms indicator for change in income can generally be collected at any time of the year. However, results may vary according to season (especially in rural areas where people's income depends on harvest, seasonal employment, etc.). It is thus crucial to apply a recall/ reference period that covers the entire project implementation (i.e. since the start of the project).

3) Prior to data collection, enumerators should be trained in basic data-collection skills. This training should also equip them with:

• A thorough understanding of the concept of cash income
• Basic knowledge on typical sources of income and influencing factors
• A sensitivity to causes of deprivation and the capability to address topics of monetary status and well-being in a culturally appropriate way
• The ability to help people recall what the situation was twelve months ago and at the beginning of the project