Can peace operations mitigate the effect of armed conflict on malnutrition? Evidence from Côte d’Ivoire

Abstract

Armed conflict increases food insecurity leading to malnutrition especially in women, but can peace operations mitigate the increased prevalence of malnutrition in conflict zones? This study uses women’s nutrition outcomes—key indicators of societal health and peace potential in a community—as a lens through which one can understand downstream, long-term, consequences of exposures to violence both with and without the presence of United Nations peacekeepers. Comparing data of adult women in Côte d’Ivoire from the Demographic and Health Surveys, across two waves that cover pre-conflict and post-conflict periods, shows that peace-operation deployments mitigated the relationship between conflict and malnutrition. Exposure to armed conflict in the absence of peace operations is associated with an increased propensity for underweight, while exposure to armed conflict in the presence of peacekeeping troops is not associated with an increased propensity for underweight. A cross-national analysis using data from the Food and Agriculture Organization also confirms that food security, as well as cereal and meat production, in the wake of conflict improves with peace-operation deployments.