Gender effects of agricultural cropping work and nutrition status in Tanzania

Although agriculture is an important source of food and income for food expenditures, women’s involvement in the agricultural cropping production process could increase their work load and reduce their BMI. Using three waves of the Tanzania National Panel Survey, we investigate the extent to which t...

Descripción completa

Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Komatsu, Hitomi, Malapit, Hazel J., Balagamwala, Mysbah
Formato: Journal Article
Lenguaje:Inglés
Publicado: Public Library of Science 2019
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://hdl.handle.net/10568/147069
_version_ 1855515653641863168
author Komatsu, Hitomi
Malapit, Hazel J.
Balagamwala, Mysbah
author_browse Balagamwala, Mysbah
Komatsu, Hitomi
Malapit, Hazel J.
author_facet Komatsu, Hitomi
Malapit, Hazel J.
Balagamwala, Mysbah
author_sort Komatsu, Hitomi
collection Repository of Agricultural Research Outputs (CGSpace)
description Although agriculture is an important source of food and income for food expenditures, women’s involvement in the agricultural cropping production process could increase their work load and reduce their BMI. Using three waves of the Tanzania National Panel Survey, we investigate the extent to which time spent in agricultural crop production affects women and men’s nutritional status among non-overweight individuals (age 20–65). We also test whether the impact of agricultural cropping work on nutritional status is modified by access to agricultural equipment, and whether gender differences exist. The study finds that time spent in agricultural cropping work is negatively associated with BMI for non-overweight individuals, albeit of small magnitude, and this finding is consistent across different crop production processes. This suggests that agricultural interventions should not ignore the implications of increasing work intensities on nutrition. While increased agricultural production could improve nutritional status by increasing agricultural income and food, the gains in nutritional status could be offset by an increase in work effort of doing agricultural work. Our results suggest that it is possible that access to equipment reduced effort for one production activity, but increased work for other activities in the production process, such as in harvesting. Furthermore, we find that the BMI of women in households with a hand powered sprayer is positively related to time spent in weeding, fertilizing, and non-harvest activities, while it is negatively correlated for men. It is possible that access to a hand powered sprayer may have helped reduce women’s work, for example, in weeding, while this was not the case for men’s work such as in ridging and fertilizing. Further disaggregation of agricultural activities in the dataset would have been helpful to provide more insights on the gender roles.
format Journal Article
id CGSpace147069
institution CGIAR Consortium
language Inglés
publishDate 2019
publishDateRange 2019
publishDateSort 2019
publisher Public Library of Science
publisherStr Public Library of Science
record_format dspace
spelling CGSpace1470692025-02-24T06:47:07Z Gender effects of agricultural cropping work and nutrition status in Tanzania Komatsu, Hitomi Malapit, Hazel J. Balagamwala, Mysbah nutritional status gender agricultural production body mass index crops farm income nutrition women agricultural workers Although agriculture is an important source of food and income for food expenditures, women’s involvement in the agricultural cropping production process could increase their work load and reduce their BMI. Using three waves of the Tanzania National Panel Survey, we investigate the extent to which time spent in agricultural crop production affects women and men’s nutritional status among non-overweight individuals (age 20–65). We also test whether the impact of agricultural cropping work on nutritional status is modified by access to agricultural equipment, and whether gender differences exist. The study finds that time spent in agricultural cropping work is negatively associated with BMI for non-overweight individuals, albeit of small magnitude, and this finding is consistent across different crop production processes. This suggests that agricultural interventions should not ignore the implications of increasing work intensities on nutrition. While increased agricultural production could improve nutritional status by increasing agricultural income and food, the gains in nutritional status could be offset by an increase in work effort of doing agricultural work. Our results suggest that it is possible that access to equipment reduced effort for one production activity, but increased work for other activities in the production process, such as in harvesting. Furthermore, we find that the BMI of women in households with a hand powered sprayer is positively related to time spent in weeding, fertilizing, and non-harvest activities, while it is negatively correlated for men. It is possible that access to a hand powered sprayer may have helped reduce women’s work, for example, in weeding, while this was not the case for men’s work such as in ridging and fertilizing. Further disaggregation of agricultural activities in the dataset would have been helpful to provide more insights on the gender roles. 2019-09-09 2024-06-21T09:11:00Z 2024-06-21T09:11:00Z Journal Article https://hdl.handle.net/10568/147069 en https://doi.org/10.1016/j.foodpol.2020.102001 Open Access Public Library of Science Komatsu, Hitomi; Malapit, Hazel J.; and Balagamwala, Mysbah. 2019. Gender effects of agricultural cropping work and nutrition status in Tanzania. PLoS ONE 14(9): e0222090. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0222090
spellingShingle nutritional status
gender
agricultural production
body mass index
crops
farm income
nutrition
women
agricultural workers
Komatsu, Hitomi
Malapit, Hazel J.
Balagamwala, Mysbah
Gender effects of agricultural cropping work and nutrition status in Tanzania
title Gender effects of agricultural cropping work and nutrition status in Tanzania
title_full Gender effects of agricultural cropping work and nutrition status in Tanzania
title_fullStr Gender effects of agricultural cropping work and nutrition status in Tanzania
title_full_unstemmed Gender effects of agricultural cropping work and nutrition status in Tanzania
title_short Gender effects of agricultural cropping work and nutrition status in Tanzania
title_sort gender effects of agricultural cropping work and nutrition status in tanzania
topic nutritional status
gender
agricultural production
body mass index
crops
farm income
nutrition
women
agricultural workers
url https://hdl.handle.net/10568/147069
work_keys_str_mv AT komatsuhitomi gendereffectsofagriculturalcroppingworkandnutritionstatusintanzania
AT malapithazelj gendereffectsofagriculturalcroppingworkandnutritionstatusintanzania
AT balagamwalamysbah gendereffectsofagriculturalcroppingworkandnutritionstatusintanzania