The National Income Dynamics Survey (NIDS), South Africa's first national household panel survey, has recently published Wave 5 of its data on DataFirst, a leading research data service provider based in the University of Cape Town.

The NIDS survey data examines the livelihoods of households and individuals over time. With over 28000 respondents, the dataset aims to provide an empirical baseline of research into how changes in poverty and wellbeing, employment, family structure, labour market participation, health and welfare, and the development of financial and social capital impact upon South African households.

To do so, the panel survey has tracked the same cohort of individuals over time, with five 'Waves' of data collection, beginning in 2008. Wave 5, released in late August, continues to build upon this longitudinal study, with a top-up sample added to account for the minor attrition of respondents experienced over the last 10 years.

To assist users in analysing and interpreting the dataset, NIDS provides specialised intensive training courses, an extensive social media engagement strategy (including Twitter, Facebook and YouTube), as well as documentation in the form of user manuals, and extensive metadata in the DataFirst record.

The NIDS dataset is a prime example of a long-running longitudinal research endeavour committed to producing valuable, public-access data. It also demonstrates that research data publication is not new - NIDS published Wave 1 of its dataset 10 years ago, in 2008.

NIDS is operationalised and managed by the Southern African Labour & Development Research Unit and funded by the Department of Monitoring and Evaluation.