Socio-economic determinants of household food security and women’s dietary diversity in rural Bangladesh: a cross-sectional study

Abstract

BackgroundThere has been limited decline in undernutrition rates in South Asia compared with the rest of Asia and one reason for this may be low levels of household food security. However, the evidence base on the determinants of household food security is limited. To develop policies intended to improve household food security, improved knowledge of the determinants of household food security is required.MethodsHousehold data were collected in 2011 from a randomly selected sample of 2,809 women of reproductive age. The sample was drawn from nine unions in three districts of rural Bangladesh. Multinomial logistic regression was conducted to measure the relationship between selected determinants of household food security and months of adequate household food provisioning, and a linear regression to measure the association between the same determinants and women’s dietary diversity score.ResultsThe analyses found that land ownership, adjusted relative risk ratio (RRR) 0.28 (CI 0.18, 0.42); relative wealth (middle tertile 0.49 (0.29, 0.84) and top tertile 0.18 (0.10, 0.33)); women’s literacy 0.64 (0.46, 0.90); access to media 0.49 (0.33, 0.72); and women’s freedom to access the market 0.56 (0.36, 0.85) all significantly reduced the risk of food insecurity. Larger households increased the risk of food insecurity, adjusted RRR 1.46 (CI 1.02, 2.09). Households with vegetable gardens 0.20 (0.11, 0.31), rich households 0.46 (0.24, 0.68) and literate women 0.37 (0.20, 0.54) were significantly more likely to have better dietary diversity scores.ConclusionHousehold food insecurity remains a key public health problem in Bangladesh, with households suffering food shortages for an average of one quarter of the year. Simple survey and analytical methods are able to identify numerous interlinked factors associated with household food security, but wealth and literacy were the only two determinants associated with both improved food security and dietary diversity. We cannot conclude whether improvements in all determinants are necessarily needed to improve household food security, but new and existing policies that relate to these determinants should be designed and monitored with the knowledge that they could substantially influence the food security and nutritional status of the population.

Determinants of dietary diversity among pregnant women in Laikipia County, Kenya: a cross-sectional study

“…The difference could be due to the fact that those with land could grow some food which may supplement what they acquire through purchases. This finding is consistent with a study conducted in Bangladesh [21] where land ownership was reported to positively influence women dietary diversity. Vitamin A rich fruits 13 5 Organ meat 10 4 Fish and sea food 4 2 Adjusted for socioeconomic and demographic characteristics (education level, marital status, occupation, household head, level of income, source of lighting, livestock ownership and household assets) and morbidity incidence Findings of this study are in agreement with findings of several other studies which have reported that dietary diversity is associated with socioeconomic status [19,[22][23][24][25].…”

“…For instance, a study by Vakili et al [25] in Ahvaz-Iran showed a significant relationship between DDS and the economic situation of the respective respondents (p < 0.05). Similarly, another study in Bangladesh found significant association between relative wealth, land ownership, livestock ownership and women dietary diversity [21]. It is evidently clear from the present study that women of a higher socioeconomic status had a higher DDS as compared to women of a lower socioeconomic status.…”

Food security measurement in rural households: the case of indigenous communities in Sierra Tarahumara, Mexico

“…In this study, the HHDS average was of 6.89, a result that differs from the ones found by De Cock et al (2013) in Limpopo province, South Africa. They reported that the households had an average HDDS of 4.5, whereas Harris-Fry et al (2015) in their research performed with women from the rural area of Bangladesh reported an average of 3.8 food groups. However, what the HDDS means in terms of public health is not clear, since there is no specific cut points (Swindale and Bilinsky, 2006;FAO, 2013b).…”

Implications of Climatic and Non-climatic Variables on Food Security in Developing Economies: A Conceptual Review

“…Food security can be estimated by per capita calorie intake availability method, food expenditure method, food-grain availability method, food-deficit method, dietary food energy supply technique, food energy deficiency and diet quality method at individual level [35,40,43,44,55,[63][64][65][66][67][68][69][70][71][72][73][74][75][76]. Food inequality across individuals and households can be measured by headcount ratio, Simpson and Shannon index methods.…”

“…Harris Fry H et al [75], concluded that wealth and land ownership were the crucial factor to reduce the food insecurity in Bangladesh. Zou J et al [93], found that China's food security is negatively impacted due to redistribution of land resources, rising international food prices, declining water resources, growth in food demand.…”