Intrahousehold dynamics in South Asia: Understanding the relationships between women's empowerment, task sharing, decision making, and diets among women

Despite the growing evidence on the role of women in agriculture and nutrition, interlinkages between empowerment among women, gendered task allocation, and nutrition are rarely studied together. Using data from the Transforming Agrifood Systems in South Asia (TAFSSA), a household survey that used a...

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Autores principales: Kumar, Neha, Quisumbing, Agnes R., Manohar, Swetha, Banerjee, Archis, Gupta, Shivani, Chauhan, Alka, Patwardhan, Sharvari, Koirala, Uma
Formato: Preprint
Lenguaje:Inglés
Publicado: MedRxiv 2025
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://hdl.handle.net/10568/168856
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author Kumar, Neha
Quisumbing, Agnes R.
Manohar, Swetha
Banerjee, Archis
Gupta, Shivani
Chauhan, Alka
Patwardhan, Sharvari
Koirala, Uma
author_browse Banerjee, Archis
Chauhan, Alka
Gupta, Shivani
Koirala, Uma
Kumar, Neha
Manohar, Swetha
Patwardhan, Sharvari
Quisumbing, Agnes R.
author_facet Kumar, Neha
Quisumbing, Agnes R.
Manohar, Swetha
Banerjee, Archis
Gupta, Shivani
Chauhan, Alka
Patwardhan, Sharvari
Koirala, Uma
author_sort Kumar, Neha
collection Repository of Agricultural Research Outputs (CGSpace)
description Despite the growing evidence on the role of women in agriculture and nutrition, interlinkages between empowerment among women, gendered task allocation, and nutrition are rarely studied together. Using data from the Transforming Agrifood Systems in South Asia (TAFSSA), a household survey that used a plate-to-farm assessment approach in three countries (Bangladesh, India and Nepal), the paper investigates the associations between empowerment of women, gendered task allocation, decision-making among women, and diets among women. Our findings reveal complex and context-specific differences in associations between task allocation, decision-making and empowerment among. While agency in decision-making among women is positively associated with empowerment in all three country contexts, associations between gendered task allocation and empowerment vary. The share of tasks performed by females, particularly in agriculture and food preparation) is positively associated with empowerment among women, but the proportion of tasks shared equally between males and females does not necessarily empower women. Gendered task allocation and empowerment among women are not significantly associated with diets of women in the three countries, owing to the greater importance of broader socio-economic and context-specific factors such as wealth, education, and regional factors in explaining the variance in dietary outcomes. These findings highlight the need to take a holistic approach that addresses gender norms and household resource constraints to improving empowerment of women, while also addressing local accessibility/availability of nutritious foods to enhance the quality of diets of women.
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spelling CGSpace1688562025-03-26T18:46:56Z Intrahousehold dynamics in South Asia: Understanding the relationships between women's empowerment, task sharing, decision making, and diets among women Kumar, Neha Quisumbing, Agnes R. Manohar, Swetha Banerjee, Archis Gupta, Shivani Chauhan, Alka Patwardhan, Sharvari Koirala, Uma intrahousehold relations decision making women's empowerment diet agriculture household surveys gender norms Despite the growing evidence on the role of women in agriculture and nutrition, interlinkages between empowerment among women, gendered task allocation, and nutrition are rarely studied together. Using data from the Transforming Agrifood Systems in South Asia (TAFSSA), a household survey that used a plate-to-farm assessment approach in three countries (Bangladesh, India and Nepal), the paper investigates the associations between empowerment of women, gendered task allocation, decision-making among women, and diets among women. Our findings reveal complex and context-specific differences in associations between task allocation, decision-making and empowerment among. While agency in decision-making among women is positively associated with empowerment in all three country contexts, associations between gendered task allocation and empowerment vary. The share of tasks performed by females, particularly in agriculture and food preparation) is positively associated with empowerment among women, but the proportion of tasks shared equally between males and females does not necessarily empower women. Gendered task allocation and empowerment among women are not significantly associated with diets of women in the three countries, owing to the greater importance of broader socio-economic and context-specific factors such as wealth, education, and regional factors in explaining the variance in dietary outcomes. These findings highlight the need to take a holistic approach that addresses gender norms and household resource constraints to improving empowerment of women, while also addressing local accessibility/availability of nutritious foods to enhance the quality of diets of women. 2025-01-09 2025-01-10T21:20:48Z 2025-01-10T21:20:48Z Preprint https://hdl.handle.net/10568/168856 en https://www.cgiar.org/news-events/news/open-access-agrifood-system-data-from-4000-households-across-bangladesh-india-and-nepal/ https://hdl.handle.net/10568/138820 https://hdl.handle.net/10568/138821 https://hdl.handle.net/10568/138822 https://hdl.handle.net/10568/138823 https://hdl.handle.net/10568/138780 https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=5082127 Open Access MedRxiv Kumar, Neha; Quisumbing, Agnes; Manohar, Swetha; Banerjee, Archis; Gupta, Shivani; Chauhan, Alka; Patwardhan, Sharvari; and Koirala, Uma. 2025. Intrahousehold dynamics in South Asia: understanding the relationships between women's empowerment, task sharing, decision making, and diets among women. MedRxiv Preprint. https://doi.org/10.1101/2025.01.08.25320196
spellingShingle intrahousehold relations
decision making
women's empowerment
diet
agriculture
household surveys
gender norms
Kumar, Neha
Quisumbing, Agnes R.
Manohar, Swetha
Banerjee, Archis
Gupta, Shivani
Chauhan, Alka
Patwardhan, Sharvari
Koirala, Uma
Intrahousehold dynamics in South Asia: Understanding the relationships between women's empowerment, task sharing, decision making, and diets among women
title Intrahousehold dynamics in South Asia: Understanding the relationships between women's empowerment, task sharing, decision making, and diets among women
title_full Intrahousehold dynamics in South Asia: Understanding the relationships between women's empowerment, task sharing, decision making, and diets among women
title_fullStr Intrahousehold dynamics in South Asia: Understanding the relationships between women's empowerment, task sharing, decision making, and diets among women
title_full_unstemmed Intrahousehold dynamics in South Asia: Understanding the relationships between women's empowerment, task sharing, decision making, and diets among women
title_short Intrahousehold dynamics in South Asia: Understanding the relationships between women's empowerment, task sharing, decision making, and diets among women
title_sort intrahousehold dynamics in south asia understanding the relationships between women s empowerment task sharing decision making and diets among women
topic intrahousehold relations
decision making
women's empowerment
diet
agriculture
household surveys
gender norms
url https://hdl.handle.net/10568/168856
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