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SOCIAL INFRASTRUCTURE

Introduction


The composition of the household is a key factor in the study of social welfare, social adjustment and study of economic dependency. As in other part of the region, however, households in the district include extended family members. Household to a very large extent is made up of couple and children. This chapter discusses some key aspect of household which include household population composition by sex and household population structure by sex. The chapter also focuses on an analysis of marriage and marital characteristics of the population in the district. Marital status is very important when dealing with population dynamics as it affects fertility. The nationality of the people is also described. Another topic discussed in this chapter is literacy and education.

 

Household Size, Household Composition and Headship

Household Size


The total household population of the district is 102,062 with 23,200 number of household. The average number of households per house in the district is less than two and the average households’ size is 4.4 respectively. The average household per house is less than the average households per house in the region and country and the household size is equal to the national average and higher than the regional average.

 

Household Population Composition by Sex


 A little more than a fifth (22.7%) of members is household heads. The table also shows that a higher proportion, about two-fifths (45.3%) of household members are children. The percentage of male household heads (28.5%) is higher than the female household heads (17.2%). out of ten of members each are spouse that is wife/husband (10.5%) and grandchildren which is 10.2 percent. The relatively high proportions of grandchildren in households reflect a living arrangement where adults with children may live with their parents in the same house. Another significant member of the household is other relative (5%).


It can be noted that there is no variation in the male and female proportions of household members who are other relatives to the head. The data also show that about one percent (1.1%) of the household members is not related to the head of household.The relationship portrayed in Table 3.1 is that children form the bulk of household members, while in-laws, step children and adopted/foster children form the smallest proportions. Shows a trend of higher percentage of males than females among all the categories of household composition except parent / parent in – law and Son / Daughter in – law which was higher males.

 

Household population by structure and sex


The household population by structure and sex in the district is shown in Table 3.3. A third (33.7%) of total household members is the nuclear families, which make up of the head and the combination of spouse and children. About a fifth (20%) of the households consists of the extended family members consisting of head, spouse, children and head’s relative.proportion of male household head is 5.6 percent which is higher than female household of 2.8 percent. Further, the proportion of males who are heads of nuclear family (35.8%) is more than that of female who are heads in nuclear families (31.8%) likewise the extended families where males have 20.3 percent and females have 19.8 percent.other notable families are single parent nuclear (11.5%) and single parent extended (16.3%). The female proportions of these two families are slightly higher than male proportions. This could be as a result of females losing their husbands and taking over the responsibilities of the family.

 

Marital Status


Population 12 years and older by sex, age-group and marital status Figure 3.1 shows persons 12 years and older and their marital status. The figure shows that 44 percent of persons 12 years and older are married and the proportion of never married is 37 percent. The proportion of persons 12 years and older into informal/consensual is 7 percent, divorced is 5 percent, widowed is 5 percent and the separated is 2 percent. Population 12 years and older by sex, marital status and level of education.The data in Table 3.4 show the population aged 12 years and older, their marital status and their level of education.


A little over a fifth (23.4%) of the district inhabitants has no formal education. More than sixty percent (64%) of the people in the district have attained basic education while 8.5 percent have secondary school education. Very few people about 0.4 percent to 2 percent have gone beyond the basic and secondary school level. At the pre tertiary level.table shows that for those who have attained secondary education, males never married recorded 15.1 percent and females never married recorded 14.9 percent respectively. At the tertiary level the married have higher percentages for both sexes.


There are more males married than female married who have attained Post-Secondary or tertiary education. The table further shows that while only 41.2 percent males widowed have no education, about fifth (71.9%) of females widowed have no education. Persons 12 years and older by sex, marital status and economic activity status.Table 3.5 shows persons 12 years and older by sex, marital status and economic activity. Of the total married population aged 12 years and older, majority (87.4%), are employed while 1.5 percent are unemployed with the rest (11.1 %) being economically not active. Among those who are never married, 29.9 percent are employed and 66.7 percent are economically not active. In terms of sex composition, more married males are employed compared to their female counterparts.

 

Information Communication Technology

Introduction


The pace rate with which Information Communication Technology (ICT) is developing and its impact on socio-economic activities cannot be overemphasized. ICT has been defined to include the full range of electronic technologies and techniques used to manage information and knowledge. It is important to note that the use of ICT has been integrated into virtually every facet of commerce, education, governance and civic activity in developed countries and has become a critical factor in creating wealth worldwide.


The development of ICT has been argued to provide opportunities for developing countries such as Ghana. The government of Ghana both past and present and other agencies have over the years made several strides to develop the ICT infrastructure so as to bridge the digital divide between Ghana and the developed world (Opoku et al, 2004). This chapter analyses the population 12 years and older, by mobile phone ownership, internet facility usage, households having fixed telephone lines and households ownership of desktop or laptop.

 

Ownership of mobile phones


The population 12 years and older by mobile phone ownership, internet facility usage, and sex. Statistics indicates that out of the population 12 years and older 67,441 in Assin South District, there are 32,266 and 35,175 females. The district has the lowest mobile phone ownership in the Central Region. Mobile phone ownership is 30.5 percent representing 20,594 out of the 67,441 persons. 36.9 percent of males own mobile phones compared to 24.7 percent females, thus percentage of males owning mobile phones is less than that of the female s in the district.

 

Use of internet


The usage of internet facilities in the district is low. Only1.7 percent of the population 12years and older use internet facility out of the total population using internet, 2.7 percent of are males whilst 0.9 percent is females.

 

Household ownership of fixed telephone lines


There are 23,200 households made up of 0.6 male-headed and 0.4percent female headed households. There are 117 households constituting 0.5 percent who have fixed telephone lines in Assin South District.

 

Household Ownership of Desktop or Laptop Computer


A total of 508 households have desktop or laptop computers constituting 2.2pe recent of the total number of households. Out of the total households who own desktop/laptop computer, 2.6 per cent are male-headed households and 1.5 percent are female-headed households.


Housing stock


The data shows that a total of 18,938 housing units were listed in Assin South District. This is about 5.5 percent of the total number of houses in the Central Region. Total number of households captured in the district is 23,200, which is about 4 percent and 0.4 percent of the total number of households in the Central Region and Ghana respectively.. The table also presents information on average population per house. The average number of people in a house in the district is 5.4. This is below the regional and national average of 6.1 for the region and 7.1 for the national. Moreover, the average household size is 4.4 which are slightly higher than the regional average of four.

 

Type of Dwelling, Holding and Tenancy arrangement


Ownership status of dwelling by sex of household head and type of locality. 8.2 shows the ownership of dwelling by sex of household head and type of locality.A high proportion of houses (69.5%) in the district are owned by household member, followed by relative not a household member (15.0%) and the least other private agencies.units not owned or being purchased by household members or a relative are either owned by private individuals, private employer, private agency or public/government who have rented these out to the occupants .


Private agency (0.3%)-owned housing is very low in the district.all the ownership status, male headed households account for the highest proportion of ownership, compare to female headed households in exception of dwelling being purchased and dwellings own by relative not a household member.

 

Type of occupied dwelling unit by sex of household head and type of locality


Table 8.3 shows the type of occupied dwelling unit by sex of household head and type of locality. The Table indicates that 46.1 percent of households in the district live in compound houses. This is the most common form of dwelling unit, followed by dwelling unit is the separate (40.0%) percent of houses. Less than a tenth (6.2%) of houses in the district is semi-detached houses and 4.4 percent in live in huts/buildings (same compound). Low proportion (1.8%) live in flat apartment. All other types of dwellings, apart from those with over one percent, have insignificant proportions ranging from 0.1 to 0.7.

 

The data in the table further shows that, 42.5 percent of male-headed households live in separate houses, the same proportion also live in compound houses. However, a little over 50 percent of female-headed live in compound houses, while more than a third (35.9%) of them also lives in separate houses. The proportion of male-headed households living in huts in the district is 5.2 percent, which is higher than female-headed living in huts.very high proportions of separate and compound houses in the district are typical characteristics of dwelling types in rural areas.


Construction materials


Main construction materials for outer wall of dwelling unit by type of locality High proportion (70.4%) of households in the district live in houses with walls made of mud brick/earth. Another main construction material for outer wall constituting 25.1 percent is cement blocks/concrete. Other construction materials which constitute about one percent are burnt bricks (1.2%), land Crete (1.0%) and wood (0.9%). Remaining households live in houses with walls made of metal sheet/slate/asbestos (0.3%), stone (0.1%), bamboo (0.2%) and palm leaf/thatch (grass)/raffia (0.1%).

 

Main construction material for the floor of dwelling unit by type of locality


Table 8.5 shows that the main construction material for the floor of dwelling (occupied dwelling) unit by type of locality in the district are largely of Cement/concrete (72.8%) and a quarter (25.4%) lives in floor made of mainly earth/mud. The Table indicate that very few (0.1% - 0.6%) households live in housing units in which the floors are made of materials other than cement/concrete and earth/mud.These materials are stone (0.5%),burnt brick (0.1%), wood (0.1%), vinyl tiles (0.1%), ceramic/porcelain/granite/marble tiles (0.6%), and terrazzo/terrazzo tiles (0.2%).

 

Main construction material for roofing of dwelling unit by type of locality


Table 8.6 shows the main material for roofing dwelling units (occupied and vacant) in the district. Metal sheets (80.0%) is the mainly use roofing material for most dwelling, followed by bamboo (4.7%). The other materials (mud/mud bricks/earth (0.6%), wood (0.6%), cement/concrete (0.4%)) are less used. Roofed houses with tiles are mainly found in urban centers and therefore not in used in the district since the district is mainly rural.

 

Room occupancy


Household by size and number of sleeping rooms occupied in dwelling unit. Number of rooms occupied by a household is one of the indicators for assessing overcrowding with reference to sleeping rooms and space available to households. There are health implications for household members. Table 8.7 shows that out of out of 23,200 household units in the district, a little over half (53%) of households in the district occupy one sleeping room. In addition, 26.4 percent in a two occupancy rooms, followed by 10.7 percent in three and 0.4 percent living in three and eight occupancy rooms.

 

The proportions of households with only one sleeping room are highest. {In terms of totality 86.3 per cent single sleeping rooms are occupied by a household of one. The corresponding figure of household of one in two rooms is 8.5 percent. Room occupancy of household of two in one room is 68.7 percent. Also room occupancy of household of 3 in 2 rooms is 59.1 per cent and household of 4 in 2 rooms is 55.4 percent. The data in the table show that significant proportions of the households have 1 to 3 rooms for sleeping. It can also be noted that room occupancy of 10 persons and more in 2 and 3 rooms have proportions of 23.7 percent and 24.3 percent respectively. Table 7 further shows that as the number of sleeping room increases the percentage distribution also reduces for most of the household size.

 

Main source of cooking fuel and cooking space used by household


Table 8.9 shows that the main source of cooking fuel and cooking space used by household. The district main source of fuel for cooking is wood (77.1%), this is followed by charcoal (12.9%), Gas (5.0%), none no cooking (3.9), kerosene and crop residue accounting for (0.8%). Table indicate further that a high proportion of household (49.6%) use separate room for exclusive use of the household as cooking space. Also, 12.4 percent use verandah of the house, whiles (12.0%) use open space in compound as cooking space, 9.6 pecent structures without roof but with wall.

 


Date Created : 11/15/2017 3:23:29 AM