The Jordanian Department of Statistics (DOS) has carried out regular Household Expenditure and Income surveys (HEIS) since 1966.

For 2017 the Kingdom’s Ministry for Planning and International Cooperation, with the support of the World Bank and the technical assistance of Sistemas Integrales, set out to review and improve the survey design and operations to ensure up-to-date information, more accurate data and more timely data delivery.

These objectives had become important in light of changes in Jordanian household income, spending, prices and employment, as well as significant shifts in internal and international migration flows. Accurate and timely data were needed to support government efforts to tackle poverty.

Sistemas Integrales’ assistance to the DOS featured ways to:

• improve response rates
• implement the online monitoring of fieldwork
• enhance the design of the household consumption module – the primary source for poverty measures – by replacing the diary method with a recall approach.

The 2017 survey had a two-stage stratified sample design, included about 20,000 households and was carried out by 180 trained field staff. The questionnaire incorporated questions to cover Syrian migrants.