Food Poverty, Vulnerability, and Food Consumption Inequality Among Smallholder Households in Ghana: A Gender-Based Perspective

Abstract

We examined gender-based household welfare differences in Ghana among smallholder households. We measured disparities in welfare outcomes (food poverty, vulnerability, and food consumption inequality) across male and female household heads and identified the set of covariates influencing them. The study utilizes a dataset from a farm household survey undertaken in Northern Ghana from October to December 2018. A multistage sampling approach was adopted in selecting 900 farm households. The Oaxaca–Blinder mean and Recentered Inference Function decomposition techniques highlighted the sources of gender differentials in household welfare outcomes. The findings indicate a significant gap in food consumption expenditure per capita and household dietary diversity scores between male- and female- headed households, and these gaps are as high as 28.2% and 18.1%, respectively. However, there are no statistically significant differences in vulnerability to food poverty between male- and female-headed households. The Lorenz curves confirm inequality in gendered households’ food consumption expenditure and dietary diversity scores. This study highlights the existence of systemic female-headed household vulnerability to food poverty in Ghana. This study provides significant evidence of the need for policymakers to address food systems’ structural deficiencies and inequalities with gender in mind.

Share of food group expenditure in Mexican households according to the gender of the head of household and size of the locality

“…Previous studies have reported differences in food expenditure and purchase preferences according to gender ( 9 , 27 , 28 ) . Addai, Ng’ombe and Tomoso found gaps in the per-capita expenditure on food between male- and female-headed households ( 27 ) .…”

“…Previous studies have reported differences in food expenditure and purchase preferences according to gender ( 9 , 27 , 28 ) . Addai, Ng’ombe and Tomoso found gaps in the per-capita expenditure on food between male- and female-headed households ( 27 ) . Kroshus et al found that households headed by females spent less on commercially prepared foods ( 28 ) , and Crane et al found differences in the number of food items purchased per receipt by gender in the USA population, which was greater in women (5·6 ± 7·8) than in men (4·1 ± 5·3; RR = 1·3, 95 % CI: 1·1, 1·4).…”

Food safety and dietary diversity in African urban cities: evidence from Ghana

“…Conversely, household size can negatively affect household dietary diversity. Due to large family sizes, poor households may not be able to spend more on adequate nutritious food and thus reduce their diet quality and diversity to meet the hunger needs of all household members [ 103 , 104 ].…”

An enterprise structure approach improves index-based crop portfolio decision-making

“…The control variables included in this study include: gender, age, household size, asset value, access to input subsidy, and farm size. Gender represents differences in production choices between male and female farmers because of their differences in access to institutional services and opportunities (The World Bank, 2008;Addai et al, 2022) while age of the household head, has been shown to positively affect profitability (Purdy et al, 1997;Mishra et al, 1999). Household size is a proxy for the production and consumption situation facing each household while education of the household head is included as it has been shown to influence productivity and management ability among farmers (Randela et al, 2008).…”