Food Security in Rural Bangladesh: Examining the Role of Women’s Earnings and Food Budget Control

Abstract

Household food security is vital to measure of a country's advancement and well-being. Three mostly usage determinants to measure household food security are per capita daily calorie availability, dietary diversity, and individuals body mass index (BMI) scores. Food security condition in rural Bangladesh is vulnerable due to poverty, unavailability and high prices of food. Almost every year food price is increasing in Bangladesh due to the low level of production, improper market management and fraud business syndicate from some top traders. In Bangladesh, food production is affected by natural calamities such as the flood in monsoon period. Rice is considering as the leading food and dominating 70% of total calorie intake in rural Bangladesh. Rural inhabitants are consuming protein and micronutrient-rich food very infrequent. The main barriers to decrease the malnutrition rate are a lack of access to protein and micronutrient rich foods and inappropriate health services. Women and children are the primary targets of ensuring nutrition security in developing worlds. However, in rural Bangladesh, in practice, both women and children are getting fewer privileges regarding food consumption and health facilitates. The main objective of this paper is to examine the role of women's earnings and food budget control. Very authentic, recognized and useful datasets are needed to get the precise insights and information about food security condition and the role of women in food security in the rural Bangladesh. Bangladesh Integrated Household Survey 2011-12 datasets are used for this study. Regression method is used to analyze the research objectives. This paper found that women control over food budget has positive roles to ensure food availability in the house and more dietary diversity. However, the BMI scores indicate that rural people are heavily under-weight and under-nutrition.

Relationship between Poverty and Food Security: Empirical Evidence from the Enclave Area of Rural Bangladesh

“…A growing number of literatures have used the probit model for identifying the influential factors of poverty (Adjasi & Osei, 2007; Balarabe, 2014; Botha, 2010; Imai et al, 2010; Jayamohan & Kitesa, 2014; Mabali & Bonkeri, 2014) and food security (Ajayi & Olutumise, 2018; Arteaga & Heflin, 2014; Costa et al, 2013; Habyarimana, 2015; Jamadder, 2018; Napoleon et al, 2017; Odusina, 2014). We reviewed previous studies and selected the variables having significant effects on poverty and food insecurity.…”

Women’s empowerment and their experience to food security in rural Bangladesh

“…To make this development more sustainable, government organizations (GOs) and non‐government organizations (NGOs) are endeavouring to renew their programs and policies. Some organizations are working to encompass rural women in income‐generating activities and to empower them, which is essential to ensure their adequate food intake (Ahmed Jamadder, 2018).…”

“…Usually, rural women take part in household activities, take care of family members especially children and the elderly and prepare meals for the family. Also, women are considerably involved in homestead farming, poultry rearing, animal husbandry and non‐agricultural activities and play a vital role in maintaining family food security (Ahmed Jamadder, 2018). In Bangladesh, women's risky positions in health and education, as well as gender inequality, contribute to chronic food insecurity of them and their family members (Sraboni et al, 2014).…”

Factors associated with child and maternal dietary diversity in the urban areas of Bangladesh

“…Dietary diversity (DD) refers to the consumption of a diverse range of foods from various food groups over a specified time period (Ruel et al., 2013 ). Though DD is one of the four dimensions of a healthy diet (Alkerwi, 2014 ; Kennedy et al., 2020 ), in the Bangladesh context, it would be the most important indicator of nutrient sufficiency, a precondition of an available healthy diet, where the staple food rice constitutes 70% of the daily meals' consumption (Jamadder, 2018 ). While a diverse diet is necessary throughout the life cycle, it is especially critical for children, adolescents, and women of reproductive age, particularly pregnant and lactating mothers (Bitew et al., 2021 ; Fahim et al., 2023 ; FAO, 2016 ; Seid et al., 2023 ).…”