HEA Sahel Atlas – September 2014

Household Economy Analysis (HEA) is a methodology for assessing livelihoods and food security. It provides a quantitative database and analysis centred on three integrated elements: first, where households normally obtain their food from, and in what proportions, to satisfy their energy requirements (measured in food calories) – whether from their harvests, or from the market, or as gifts or collected wild foods, etc.

Second, how do they obtain the cash to pay for purchased food and other essentials for life and livelihood? Third, what do they spend their money on, and in what proportions? Information on these questions and associated subjects is gathered in relation to wealth groups within the population: in rural studies, the split is usually into four groups: « Very Poor » households, « Poor » households, « Middle » households and « Better-Off » households (see Appendix 2 for the proportions of the population in each wealth group).

This document is a revision of the 2013 Pilot Atlas and takes into account revisions made to the maps in view of new HEA baseline studies in additional livelihood zones after that first atlas was published. In this, as in the original exercise, we have looked for geographical patterns in HEA information across the Sahel on a number of key subjects. Our aim was to see if a visual appreciation of the data adds to our understanding of what it can tell us. Three maps are presented on each theme. First, we present the average values across the four wealth groups, weighted according to the proportion of households or population in each wealth group.