The Armenian Household Budget Survey (HBS) 1996 was designed to be a nationally representative survey capable of measuring the standard of living in the Republic of Armenia (ROA) through the collection of data on the family, demographic, socio-economic and financial status of households. The survey was conducted in November December 1996, on the whole territory of the republic by the State Department of Statistics (SDS) of ROA with technical and financial assistance from the World Bank. The data collected included information on household composition, housing conditions, education level of household members, employment and income, savings, borrowing, as well as details on levels of expenditure including those on food, non-food, health, tourism and business. The survey covered about 100 villages and 28 towns. The size of the sample was 5,040 households of which 4,920 responded which makes the survey the largest carried out in Armenia to date and one with a very high response rate for a transition economy. The expenditure part of the data was collected using two different methods administered for different households. The methods are: recall method in which households were asked, during the interview, about their expenditures made during the last 30 days preceding the date of the interview; and a diary method where households were given a diary they used to record details about their income and expenditure on a daily basis for 30 days during the interview period. About 25% of the total sample of interviewed households used diaries and 75% used the recall method. The unit of study in the survey was the household, defined as a group of co-resident individuals with a common living budget. As will be explained in detail, the AHBS 96 was generally designed as a two stage stratified sampling, but for large urban areas with an almost definite probability of being selected, a one stage sampling was adopted. The Armenian HBS 1996 is not a standard Living Standards Measurement Study (LSMS) survey the questionnaire used is more limited in scope and much different in format from a typical LSMS. This survey used no community or price questionnaires; it did not use most of LSMS’ prototypical fieldwork and data quality procedures, and the technical assistance did not come from the LSMS group in the World Bank. Nonetheless, the goals are some what LSMS-like and the data is certainly worth archiving. They are therefore being entered into the LSMS archives to guarantee their future accessibility to World Bank and other users.
