Constructing Multidimensional Education and Health Welfare Indexes in Cameroon: A Multiple Correspondence Analyses

This paper aimed to review the concept of Multiple Correspondence Analyses (MCA) in the area of multidimensional poverty measurement and apply this analysis to multidimensional welfare in Cameroon. Use is made of the second (2001) and third (2007) Cameroon Consumption Household Survey. Results indicated that modalities like knowing how to read and write, sector of consultation, type of sanitary centre, appreciation of health status, cost of going to the hospital, cost of education, time and distance to the nearest school or hospital affect capabilities like education and health and therefore household economic well-being. Policy suggestion is that defining adequate policy mixes that blend human capital investment, in education and health, and complementary investments like infrastructural development that go together with human investment should be suggested to policy makers as ways of consolidating development and increasing household welfare.