Questions to be addressed

The questions to be addressed by the case study are as follows:

What is the distribution of household heads by age and gender? What importance do livestock play in the homesteads and how important are cattle? What are the primary purposes for keeping cattle? Which members of homesteads own cattle, and who are responsible for different cattle activities? Does cattle ownership among members of the homestead vary according to the gender of the head of the homestead?

Initially, a summary of the data is presented showing the number of homesteads sampled, the number of homesteads that kept cattle and the number of these recorded with cattle as the primary species.

The other questions are then addressed through exploratory and descriptive methods with frequencies using pie charts, bar charts and tables followed by the application of statistical tests as necessary.

Multiple response data are also summarised through the calculation of indices (based on relative rankings) that provide further information on the relative importance of livestock, crops, home industries and salary/wages to the income of the homesteads, and also the purposes for which cattle are kept.