IPROS : final report (social progress indicators project), data, methods, principal indicators, institutionalization

The report is based on document and computer software review. The system of social indicators was never developed and, as conceived, is not scientifically valid. El Salvador"s institutional ability to absorb a data-synthesizing project is the same now as it was when the special progress indicators project (IPROS) began. There is still a strong need to analyze data; many technicians can apply the data; the technology is intact for gathering, processing and, disseminating such data. This project has been split between empirical and policy orientations and the key coordinator, the Ministry of Planning, has such a strong antipathy towards IPROS that what is institutionalized will have to overcome a bad legacy. IPROS was developed to assist programs oriented to improving the level of living for the rural poor, and to incorporate social indicators as part of a National Social Accounts System to monitor social and economic development. A technical coordinator was hired for the last three months of the project to see if the project could be put back on track. After assessing the situation, this coordinator decided the time was better spent in documentation and broadening data access (through interactive computer programs and training seminars),than in reviving the original concept. IPROS developed a rich data base: five multipurpose household surveys were taken in 1979-80. The data"s subject range is broad; education and employment were studied in detail. The project"s weakness is that so many survey variables were generated that access and evaluation is difficult. The problem is not the quantity of variables but their organization. Variables were developed including geographical region, age, sex, income, occupation and industry of the household"s primary worker, education, housing, nutritional health, demographic levels, and seasonal migration fields. The variables were cross-tabulated to select groups in need of social aid.