Privation Multidimensionnelle Et Bien-Etre Non Monétaire Au Cameroun: Une Approche Par La Logique Floue[Multidimensional Deprivation And Non-Monetary Well-Being In Cameroon: An Approach Using Fuzzy Set Theory]

If well-being and poverty are considered antonyms, their understanding remains complex, because the concepts are seen differently from an anthropological, sociological and economic point of view. The objective of this article is to measure multidimensional poverty and non-monetary well-being in Cameroon. In other words, we will build a composite index of well-being in addition to a multidimensional analysis of poverty. To implement it, we will use fuzzy logic which was developed by Lotfi Zadeh in 1965 and which is formalized mathematically by the theory of fuzzy subsets. The latter appears to be an appropriate tool for specifying vague concepts such as poverty. To carry out this work, we used the third Cameroonian household survey (ECAM 3) to identify poor households. The development of the different indices was done in three stages: first, the choice of non-monetary dimensions, then the extraction of deprivation indicators and finally the aggregation of results. The main results show that the fuzzy poverty index in Cameroon is 0.6010. This means that 60.10% of Cameroonian households are structurally poor. By decomposing this index by region, stratum and sex of the head of household, the Far North region has the highest fuzzy proportion (P = 0.7367), and the two big cities of Yaoundé and Douala record high scores. Overall, rural areas have the highest proportion of poor households (0.7463), while households headed by women are more affected by the phenomenon of poverty (0.6264). However, it should be noted that the level of deprivation is higher for the drinking water supply mode (0.7657), the waste water evacuation mode (0.9501), the level of education of the chiefs of households (0.7430) and household income (0.9051). In terms of contribution to poverty, the Far North is the region that contributes the most (0.1585), followed by the Northwest (0.1452) and the West (0.1161). In terms of well-being, economic capabilities contribute the most to the well-being of households, with better scores for urban households. Consequently, the formulation of poverty reduction policies in terms of sanitation, drinking water supply, improvement of the health service etc. should be directed mainly to rural areas.