Assessing association of household diet diversity with mother’s time use on productive and reproductive activities

A case for gender sensitive social safety nets

Bibliographic Data

ID15096065
AuthorsSurabhi Chaturvedi (St. John's National Academy of Health Sciences), Sumathi Swaminathan (0000-0002-4006-1049, St. John's National Academy of Health Sciences), Sanchit Makkar (St. John's National Academy of Health Sciences), Anjaly Teresa John (St. John's National Academy of Health Sciences), Tinku Thomas (0000-0002-1786-6076, St.John's Medical College Hospital, corresponding author)
Year2024
Volume27
Issue1
Pagese33-e33
Publication date2024-01-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenuePublic Health Nutrition (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1368-9800 • E-ISSN: 1475-2727
PublisherCambridge University Press (CUP) (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1017/s1368980023002963
PMID38171547
OpenAlexW4390563485
LanguageEN
Citations received2
References cited29

Objective: In South Asia, while women make substantial economic contributions through their participation in agricultural sector, these contributions are undercounted as most of their work is underpaid or unpaid. This paper examines how mothers allocate their time to productive and reproductive activities and its association with a household’s ability to achieve high household diet diversity score. Design: The analysis uses data on household consumption and expenditure including food during the kharif (June to October) season (seeds are sown) and a modular time-use survey. Setting: Two districts of rural Bihar, India. Participants: Mothers with children less than 5 years of age and supported by the head of the household from 2026 households. Results: The estimates indicate that the high household diet diversity (High HDDS ≥ 10) is associated with greater time spent in reproductive activities by all women (OR = 1·12, 95 % CI: 1·06, 1·18). However, with increasing time spent in productive activities by the women the odds of achieving ‘High HDDS’ reduced (OR = 0·83, 95 % CI: 0·77, 0·89) in adjusted logistic regression analysis. Conclusion: The findings highlight propensity to achieve ‘High HDDS’ in Bihar increased with mothers allocating time towards reproductive activities, while it had an opposing effect with mothers allocating time on productive activities. Our study highlights that the policies that encourage women’s participation in agriculture or livestock should acknowledge the unpaid nature of some of the productive activities and design programs to improve economic agency of women to actuate the true potential of agriculture-nutrition pathways

Agency (philosophy · Agriculture · Business · Diversity (politics · Economics · Environmental health · Geography · Kharif crop · Logistic regression · Odds · Political science · Socioeconomics · Sociology · Child Nutrition and Water Access · Demography · Food Security and Health in Diverse Populations · Medicine · Poverty, Education, and Child Welfare

Tools

Open DOIOpen Access