Household transport expenditure in Sub-Saharan African cities: measurement and analysis

Lourdes Diaz Olvera (), Didier Plat () and Pascal Pochet ()
Additional contact information
Lourdes Diaz Olvera: LET - Laboratoire d'économie des transports - UL2 - Université Lumière - Lyon 2 - ENTPE - École Nationale des Travaux Publics de l'État - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique
Didier Plat: LET - Laboratoire d'économie des transports - UL2 - Université Lumière - Lyon 2 - ENTPE - École Nationale des Travaux Publics de l'État - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique
Pascal Pochet: LET - Laboratoire d'économie des transports - UL2 - Université Lumière - Lyon 2 - ENTPE - École Nationale des Travaux Publics de l'État - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique

Post-Print from HAL

Abstract: In Sub-Saharan Africa the cost of transport faced by city dwellers, particularly the poor, tends to add to their travel and economic difficulties. Knowledge of the burden of transport expenditure in the household budget seems essential for passenger transport policy formulation in order to improve their travel conditions and social equity. The literature review and the three case studies (Dar es Salaam, Niamey, Ouagadougou) show that estimates of travel expenditure are partially conditioned by survey data collection methodologies and by the choice of equivalence scales used to compare the standard of living of households. According to consumption and expenditure survey data, the relative amount spent on transport increases as household expenditure rises. Conversely, the share of transport decreases as income rises when analysing travel survey data. The sensitivity to the equivalence scale is tested for several transport expenditure indicators: the share of travel expenditure by household budget quintile, the concentration indices for public and private household transport expenditure and the average monthly expenditure per person on public and private transport. Results also highlight the fact that transport is a major component of household expenditure, that there are considerable inequalities between households and that regular use of motorized transport is unaffordable for poor populations. These findings have implications for both improving expenditure data collection methodologies in the transport area and formulating pro-poor urban policies.

Keywords: Transport expenditure; Urban transport; Survey methodology; Equivalence scale; Poverty; Sub-Saharan Africa (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2008
Note: View the original document on HAL open archive server: https://shs.hal.science/halshs-00264231
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (38)

Published in Journal of Transport Geography, 2008, 16 (1), pp. 1-13. ⟨10.1016/j.jtrangeo.2007.04.001⟩

Downloads: (external link)
https://shs.hal.science/halshs-00264231/document (application/pdf)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:hal:journl:halshs-00264231

DOI: 10.1016/j.jtrangeo.2007.04.001

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in Post-Print from HAL
Bibliographic data for series maintained by CCSD ().