Increased Household Income Improves Nutrient Consumption in Pakistan: A Cross-Sectional Study

Abstract

The provision of high-quality food is a primary factor in ensuring adequate nourishment and preventing malnourishment-related diseases in Pakistan. This study, therefore, aimed to quantify the impact of income on nutrient consumption in Pakistan, with the hypothesis that income has a primary role in reducing malnourishment in the developing world. To do this, we estimated nutrient–income elasticity—defined as the proportion of change in nutrient consumption in response to a change in income—for total calories, macronutrients, and micronutrients, using the nationally representative Household Integrated Economic Survey data (2010–2011) for Pakistan. Nutrient–income elasticity values were derived using several parametric regression approaches. We also assessed the non-linearity and endogeneity of the relationship. Calorie–income elasticity was found to be significantly different from zero, irrespective of the estimation technique used. Income elasticity for macronutrients and micronutrients was also found to be significantly different from zero, ranging from 0.29 to 0.65. This study, therefore, supports the hypothesis that increased household income likely improves nutrient consumption.

Sustainability and scalability of egg consumption in Burkina Faso for infant and young child feeding

“…The alleviation of time poverty that afflicts mothers ( 31 , 32 ), allowed the mothers to better care for all members of their households, including themselves, a finding that supports previous research ( 33 , 34 ). Mothers also reported new levels of financial independence, a critical pathway for improving maternal and child health and nutrition ( 25 , 35 , 36 ). While facilitating factors such as education about the nutritional value of eggs and ongoing spousal support allowed for continued IYC egg consumption at follow-up, egg availability emerged as an important constraint, limiting the frequency of IYC egg consumption, even among women where motivation remained high.…”

Assessment of non-linearity in calorie–income relationship in Pakistan

“…To compute the calorie consumption amount from the reported food quantities, we applied the conversion factors from Food Composition Table for Pakistan ( 31 ), which contains data on nutrient contents for various food items [for details of data extraction, refer to the study by ( 4 )]. For example, the nutrient consumed of a particular type like calorie is as follows:…”

“…where N is the quantity of the particular nutrient consumed, θ i is the average nutrient content of a unit of food i , and Q i is the number of units consumed of food i ( 4 ).…”

“…The role of income in calorie consumption continues to generate serious investigations, with contrasting results appearing throughout the literature. The debate regarding the size of the calorie–income relationship is well-documented in the literature [details are given in ( 4 )]. Recently, Santeramo and Shabnam ( 5 ) well-summarized this debate by providing a meta-analysis of articles published on this issue in several countries of the world.…”

The Direct and Structure Effect of Income on Nutrition Demand of Chinese Rural Residents

“…Van den Broeck et al (2021) confirmed that income growth in rural Tanzania improves nutrition, both in terms of calorie quantity and food quality [ 8 ]. Other studies such as Ogundari et al (2016) and Colen et al (2018) for sub-Saharan Africa and Africa [ 9 , 10 ], Thi et al (2018) for Vietnam [ 11 ], Bhuyan et al (2020) for India [ 12 ], Shabnam et al (2021) for Pakistan [ 13 ], and Ali et al (2018) for Nepal [ 14 ] have also found a positive relationship between income and calorie demand. However, another strand of literature suggests that calorie demand is income-inelastic, which indicates that households are able to smooth calorie consumption even if income changes.…”