Climate variability, women empowerment and intra-gender welfare allocation : effects on child nutrition and school absenteeism in Ethiopia

Abstract

This study examines the intra-gender welfare outcomes both with and without adverse household level shocks using two unique panel datasets, namely Living Standards Measurement Study Integrated Survey (LSMS) and the Feed the Future (FtF) datasets. One main variable of interest from the FtF dataset is the Women Empowerment in Agriculture Index (WEAI). The study’s primary aim is to examine intra-gender resource allocation decisions particular to child nutrition and school absenteeism during adverse climatic shocks to the household. The study also aims to examine the effect of women empowerment in agriculture on intra-gender resource allocation decision during household-level climate shocks.

Mixed-effect model estimation strategy is employed to analyse how parents’ allocation decisions affect nutrition allocation between boys and girls during adverse climatic shocks to the household. Correlated random effects panel model with instrumental variables method is applied to estimate the impact of WEAI on children nutrition outcomes. Similarly, random effects probit model to analyse the effects of adverse climatic shocks on school absenteeism in the rural Ethiopia.

Results from the mixed-effects model estimation strategy found that the household level shock index for male does not have a significant effect on child nutrition. Nutrition equality could be due to i) the girls’ biological bodily development, which causes differences in trouble tolerance (girls tolerate hardship better than boys) such that girls’ nutrition remains the same as that of boys; and ii) the boys’ physical exercise causes weight loss so that it brings their nutrition outcome down, making it equal to that of the girls. These explanations suggest the needs for energy food supplementation for boys and for equal care for girls and boys.

The correlated random effects (CRE) panel model with the instrumental variables method estimates the impact of WEAI on children nutrition outcomes. Separate estimation of the five disempowerment scores to dismantle the effect of each disempowerment score is executed. CRE results confirm that women empowerment in agriculture for male does not have a significant effect on child nutrition outcomes. Similarly, child nutrition outcomes are improved by programme interventions, but with no gender bias effect. The five domains of disempowerment score, that is, disempowerment in production, resources ownership, income decision making, leadership and time, correlate negatively with child nutrition outcomes, yet with no gender-biased effect. The results of the random effects probit estimation technique shows that an adverse household-level climate shock index has a direct positive significant effect on school absenteeism for both sexes. However, climate shock index for male does not show any gender-biased effect on school absenteeism. Whereas, climate shock for child age indicates an inverse significant correlation with school absenteeism, which implies that younger children attend fewer classes than older children in the household. Mother’s education levels and child school absenteeism indicates a negative significant correlation at higher education levels, magnifying that educated mothers send their children to school more frequently than uneducated ones. These findings suggest a climate shock impact mitigation strategy so that child-generated income or work burdens of children in the household during bad times are compensated via other means, so absenteeism is minimized.