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Determinants of dietary diversity and the potential role of men in improving household nutrition in Tanzania.

ABSTRACT: Good nutrition is a prerequisite for a healthy and active life, especially for agriculture-dependent households. However, diets in most households in Tanzania lack diversity because the intake of meat, poultry, fish, and vegetables and fruits is low. This study estimates factors influencing dietary diversity of the household, children under five years, and women using primary survey data. It qualitatively assesses male dietary patterns and men's potential role in improving the nutritional status of the entire household. The findings show that the most consumed foods within the household are cereals, vegetables, oils and fats, spices, condiments and beverages. Children (d = 0.4; p<0.05) and women (d = 0.5; p<0.01) in female-headed households have low dietary diversity compared to those in male-headed households. Women and children access less diverse diets since 46% and 26%, achieved minimum dietary diversity respectively. Production of vegetables (coef. 0.34; p<0.05) play an important role in improving the dietary diversity of women. Gender (coef. 0.05; p<0.10) and education of the household head (coef. 0.02; p<0.01), food preparation and nutrition training (coef. 0.10; p<0.05) are important factors influencing dietary diversity of the members of a household. Results suggest that there is a need to support community-based programs to provide information on food and the importance of vegetables, their preparation, consumption and utilization to address food and nutrition challenges. Men can contribute towards improving household nutrition security by reducing consumption of food away from the home, especially during periods of food shortages. We recommend the use of complementary quantitative research to determine the patterns and dynamics of men's dietary diversity and compare it with that of other household members.

SUBMITTER: Ochieng J

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5726653 | biostudies-literature | 2017

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Determinants of dietary diversity and the potential role of men in improving household nutrition in Tanzania.

Ochieng Justus J Afari-Sefa Victor V Lukumay Philipo Joseph PJ Dubois Thomas T

PloS one 20171212 12

Good nutrition is a prerequisite for a healthy and active life, especially for agriculture-dependent households. However, diets in most households in Tanzania lack diversity because the intake of meat, poultry, fish, and vegetables and fruits is low. This study estimates factors influencing dietary diversity of the household, children under five years, and women using primary survey data. It qualitatively assesses male dietary patterns and men's potential role in improving the nutritional status ...[more]

PMID: 29232413

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Project description:BackgroundThere are urgent calls for the transformation of agriculture and food systems to address human and planetary health issues. Nutrition-sensitive agriculture and agroecology promise interconnected solutions to these challenges, but evidence of their impact has been limited.ObjectivesIn a cluster-randomized trial (NCT02761876), we examined whether a nutrition-sensitive agroecology intervention in rural Tanzania could improve children's dietary diversity. Secondary outcomes were food insecurity and child anthropometry. We also posited that such an intervention would improve sustainable agricultural practices (e.g., agrobiodiversity, intercropping), women's empowerment (e.g., participation in decision making, time use), and women's well-being (e.g., dietary diversity, depression).MethodsFood-insecure smallholder farmers with children aged <1 y from 20 villages in Singida, Tanzania, were invited to participate. Villages were paired and publicly randomized; control villages received the intervention after 2 y. One man and 1 woman "mentor farmer" were elected from each intervention village to lead their peers in agroecological learning on topics including legume intensification, nutrition, and women's empowerment. Impact was estimated using longitudinal difference-in-differences fixed-effects regression analyses.ResultsA total of 591 households (intervention: n = 296; control: n = 295) were enrolled; 90.0% were retained to study end. After 2 growing seasons, the intervention improved children's dietary diversity score by 0.57 food groups (out of 7; P < 0.01), and the percentage of children achieving minimum dietary diversity (≥4 food groups) increased by 9.9 percentage points during the postharvest season. The intervention significantly reduced household food insecurity but had no significant impact on child anthropometry. The intervention also improved a range of sustainable agriculture, women's empowerment, and women's well-being outcomes.ConclusionsThe magnitude of the intervention's impacts was similar to or larger than that of other nutrition-sensitive interventions that provided more substantial inputs but were not agroecologically focused. These data suggest the untapped potential for nutrition-sensitive agroecological approaches to achieve human health while promoting sustainable agricultural practices.

Project description:BackgroundHousehold food and nutrition insecurity continued to be a development and policy agenda in Ethiopia. Assessing the patterns and determinants of household dietary diversity is an important area of research given its importance for policy uptake in the country. This study is, therefore, initiated to identify the dominant food groups consumed by households and to investigate the determinants of household dietary diversity in the country.MethodWe used data from the 4th wave of the Ethiopian socioeconomic survey. The survey data for this study included 3,115 households living in rural areas (hereafter called 'rural households'). Household Dietary Diversity Score (HDDS) was calculated and categorized as per the FAO's recommendation: low HDDS category for those who consume three or less food groups, medium HDDS for those who consume four to six, and high HDDS for those who consume seven and more food groups during the past seven days. Ordinal logistic regression model was employed to estimate the determinants of rural household's dietary diversity.ResultsCereals were the most dominant food group consumed by 96.4% of the households followed by pulses, which was consumed by 82% of the households Nutrition-dense food commodities such as lean meat, vegetables and fruits were the least consumed food groups by households in Ethiopia. In terms of determinants of dietary diversity, female headed households have 38% more chance of consuming diverse foods compared to their male-headed counterparts (AOR = 1.38, 95% CI: 1.10, 1.73). Household heads who completed secondary education and above have 62% more chance of consuming diverse foods compared to uneducated household heads (AOR = 1.62, 95% CI: 1.2, 2.30). Household heads who are single have 37% less chance of consuming diverse foods compared to those household heads who are married (AOR = 0.63, 95% CI: 0.50, 0.80). Those households located in Harari regional state and in the rural surroundings of Diredawa town have 6.56 times more chance of consuming diverse foods compared to those households living in Tigray and Amhara regional states (AOR = 6.56, 95% CI: 4.60, 9.37). The results also highlighted that households who are in the upper wealth category have 9 times more chance of consuming diverse foods compared to those households who are the lower wealth category (AOR = 8.54, 95% CI: 6.79, 11.98).

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Determinants of dietary diversity and the potential role of men in improving household nutrition in Tanzania.

Publications

Determinants of dietary diversity and the potential role of men in improving household nutrition in Tanzania.

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