SPC_FJI_2024_HFPS-Q1_v01_M_v01_A_PUF
High Frequency Phone Survey, Continuous Data Collection 2024
Quarter 1 2024 to Quarter 3 2024
HFPS 2024
| Name | Country code |
|---|---|
| Fiji | FJI |
Other Household Survey [hh/oth]
A series of High Frequency Phone Surveys (HFPS), which began in 2020 as a way to monitor the socio-economic impacts of the COVID-19 Pandemic, and since 2023 has grown into a series of continuous surveys for socio-economic monitoring. In Fiji, monthly HFPS data collection commenced in February 2024 on topics including employment, income, food security, health, food prices, assets and well-being.
Access to up-to-date socio-economic data is a widespread challenge in Pacific Island Countries. To increase data availability and promote evidence-based policymaking, the Pacific Observatory provides innovative solutions and data sources to complement existing survey data and analysis. One of these data sources is a series of High Frequency Phone Surveys (HFPS), which began in 2020 as a way to monitor the socio-economic impacts of the COVID-19 Pandemic, and since 2023 has grown into a series of continuous surveys for socio-economic monitoring. See https://www.worldbank.org/en/country/pacificislands/brief/the-pacific-observatory for further details.
In Fiji, monthly HFPS data collection commenced in February 2024 on topics including employment, income, food security, health, food prices, assets and well-being. Fieldwork took place in rounds roughly one month in length in a panel method, where each household was only recontacted at least thirty days after the previous interview. Each month has approximately 700 households in the sample and is representative of urban and rural areas and divisions. This dataset contains combined monthly survey data between February and October 2024. There is one date file for household level data with a unique household ID, and a separate file for individual level data within each household data, that can be matched to the household file using the household ID, and which also has a unique individual ID within the household data which can be used to track individuals over time within households
Sample survey data [ssd]
Household, invidiual.
Cleaned, labelled and anonymized version of the master file.
2025-03-21
-HOUSEHOLD: Interview information and Basic information (S1); Household roster (S2); Access to Services and shocks (S3); Subjective well-being (S4); Food security (S5); Views on the economy and government (S6); Household income (S7); Agriculture (S9); Medical service utilization (S10).
-INDIVIDUAL: Basic information (S1); Employment information (S8).
Urban and rural areas of Fiji.
| Name | Affiliation |
|---|---|
| Taufik Indrakesuma and William Seitz | World Bank Group |
| Name | Affiliation | Role |
|---|---|---|
| Pacific Observatory | Technical assistance | |
| International Bank for Reconstruction and Development | World Bank Group | Technical assistance |
| Name | Abbreviation | Role |
|---|---|---|
| World Bank | WB | Funding |
| Australian Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade | DFAT | Funding |
The initial sample was drawn through Random Digit Dialing (RDD) with geographic stratification. As an objective of the survey was to measure changes in household economic wellbeing over time, the HFPS sought to contact a consistent number of households across each division month to month. It had a probability-based weighted design, with a proportionate stratification to achieve geographical representation. A panel was established from the outset, where in each subsequent round after February 2024, the survey firm would first attempt to contact all households from the previous month and then attempt to contact households from earlier months that had dropped out. After previous numbers were exhausted, RDD with geographic stratification was used for replacement households. This dataset includes 4,120 completed interviews with 1,360 unique households.
The general principle of the weighting methodology was to generate nationally representative results by month, rather than by rounds, to present more salient analytical results from the survey. Due to the data collection rule that no household should be contacted twice within a 30-day period, grouping by month rather than round would not lead to any overlap in households within the month.
A shortcoming of using random digit dialing in a phone survey is that the resulting data is representative of mobile phone owners, who tend to be of higher income groups and more concentrated in urban areas, rather than being representative of the whole population. Mobile phone penetration in Fiji is relatively high compared to its Pacific peers, with 88.4 percent of the population in 2023 estimated to own a mobile phone, according to the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) World Telecommunication/ICT Indicators Database. However, to make statistically meaningful inferences about the overall population instead of the country's mobile phone holders, it is necessary to reweight the survey data.
The dataset was reweighted using the latest nationally representative household survey, which was the Household Income and Expenditure Survey (HIES) from 2019/20. A set of common variables between the 2019/20 HIES and the High Frequency Phone Survey (HFPS) data set were identified and made to be comparable through re-coding and aggregation of response options, where response options were different.
The household weight variable in the household dataset is named “hh_weight” and represents household cross-sectional weights. The individual data set contains individual weights for individual analysis; it is named as 'person_weight.' Both weight variables add up to the total number of households and the total population of the 2019/20 HIES for every month of the data.
The questionnaire, which can be found in the External Resources of this documentation, is available in English, with iTaukei translation available. There were few changes to the questionnaire across the survey months, with some sections only asked in some rounds, such as the digital governance module in rounds 3 and 4. The survey instrument consists of the following modules, with notes in parentheses on dates of collection for questions which were not collected consistently across the whole survey period:
| Start | End | Cycle |
|---|---|---|
| 2024-02-01 | 2024-10-30 | Data collection |
| Name |
|---|
| M-CRIL |
The HFPS was conducted between February and October 2024 by M-CRIL using a team of local enumerators operating from Suva, with remote technical support.
The raw data were cleaned by the World Bank team using STATA. This included formatting and correcting errors identified through the survey's monitoring and quality control process. The data are presented in two datasets: a household dataset and an individual dataset. The individual dataset contains information on individual demographics and labor market outcomes of all household members aged 15 and above, and the household data set contains information about household demographics, food security, household income, agriculture activities, social protection, subjective well-being, access to services, shocks, and perceptions. The household identifier (panel_hid) is available in both the household dataset and the individual dataset. The individual identifier (panel_indid) can be found in the individual dataset.
| Is signing of a confidentiality declaration required? | Confidentiality declaration text |
|---|---|
| yes | Before being granted access to the dataset, all users must formally agree: 1. To make no copies of any files or portions of files to which s/he is granted access except those authorized by the data depositor. 2. Not to use any technique in an attempt to learn the identity of any person, establishment, or sampling unit not identified on public use data files. 3. To hold in strictest confidence the identification of any establishment or individual that may be inadvertently revealed in any document, discussion, or analysis. Such inadvertent identification revealed in her/his analysis needs to be immediately brought to the attention of the data depositor. |
The dataset has been anonymized and is available as a Public Use Dataset. It is accessible to all for statistical and research purposes only, under the following terms and conditions:
"Fiji Islands, High Frequency Phone Survey Q1 2024 to Q3 2024, Continuous Data Collection 2024 (HFPS 2024-Q1), Version 01 of the licensed dataset (March 2025), provided by the Pacific Data Hub - Microdata Library. https://microdata.pacificdata.org/index.php/home"
The user of the data acknowledges that the original collector of the data, the authorized distributor of the data, and the relevant funding agency bear no responsibility for use of the data or for interpretations or inferences based upon such uses.
| Name | Affiliation | |
|---|---|---|
| Taufik Indrakesuma | World Bank Group | tindrakesuma@worldbank.org |
DDI_SPC_FJI_2024_HFPS-Q1_v01_M_v01_A_PUF
| Name | Abbreviation | Affiliation | Role |
|---|---|---|---|
| Statistics for Development Division | SDD | Pacific Commutniy (SPC) | Documentation of the study |
2025-03-21
-Version 01 (March 2025): This is the first attempt at documenting the first continuous data collection of Quarter 1 2024 to Quarter 3 2024 of Fiji Islands. Done by Statistics for Development Division at Noumea, New Caledonia.