Households and food security: lessons from food secure households in East Africa

Background What are the key factors that contribute to household-level food security? What lessons can we learn from food secure households? What agricultural options and management strategies are likely to benefit female-headed households in particular? This paper addresses these questions using a...

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Autores principales: Silvestri, Silvia, Douxchamps, Sabine, Kristjanson, Patricia M., Förch, Wiebke, Radeny, Maren A.O., Mutie, Ianetta, Quirós, Carlos F., Herrero, Mario, Ndungu, Anthony, Ndiwa, Nicholas N., Mango, Joash, Claessens, Lieven, Rufino, Mariana C.
Formato: Journal Article
Lenguaje:Inglés
Publicado: Springer 2015
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://hdl.handle.net/10568/69239
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author Silvestri, Silvia
Douxchamps, Sabine
Kristjanson, Patricia M.
Förch, Wiebke
Radeny, Maren A.O.
Mutie, Ianetta
Quirós, Carlos F.
Herrero, Mario
Ndungu, Anthony
Ndiwa, Nicholas N.
Mango, Joash
Claessens, Lieven
Rufino, Mariana C.
author_browse Claessens, Lieven
Douxchamps, Sabine
Förch, Wiebke
Herrero, Mario
Kristjanson, Patricia M.
Mango, Joash
Mutie, Ianetta
Ndiwa, Nicholas N.
Ndungu, Anthony
Quirós, Carlos F.
Radeny, Maren A.O.
Rufino, Mariana C.
Silvestri, Silvia
author_facet Silvestri, Silvia
Douxchamps, Sabine
Kristjanson, Patricia M.
Förch, Wiebke
Radeny, Maren A.O.
Mutie, Ianetta
Quirós, Carlos F.
Herrero, Mario
Ndungu, Anthony
Ndiwa, Nicholas N.
Mango, Joash
Claessens, Lieven
Rufino, Mariana C.
author_sort Silvestri, Silvia
collection Repository of Agricultural Research Outputs (CGSpace)
description Background What are the key factors that contribute to household-level food security? What lessons can we learn from food secure households? What agricultural options and management strategies are likely to benefit female-headed households in particular? This paper addresses these questions using a unique dataset of 600 households that allows us to explore a wide range of indicators capturing different aspects of performance and well-being for different types of households—female-headed, male-headed, food secure, food insecure—and assess livelihoods options and strategies and how they influence food security. The analysis is based on a detailed farm household survey carried out in three sites in Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania. Results Our results suggest that food insecurity may not be more severe for female-headed households than male-headed households. We found that food secure farming households have a wider variety of crops on their farms and are more market oriented than are the food insecure. More domestic assets do not make female-headed households more food secure. For the other categories of assets (livestock, transport, and productive), we did not find evidence of a correlation with food security. Different livelihood portfolios are being pursued by male versus female-headed households, with female-headed households less likely to grow high-value crops and more likely to have a less diversified crop portfolio. Conclusions These findings help identify local, national and regional policies and actions for enhancing food security of female-headed as well as male-headed households. These include interventions that improve households’ access to information, e.g., though innovative communication and knowledge-sharing efforts and support aimed at enhancing women’s and men’s agricultural market opportunities.
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spelling CGSpace692392025-11-12T04:27:07Z Households and food security: lessons from food secure households in East Africa Silvestri, Silvia Douxchamps, Sabine Kristjanson, Patricia M. Förch, Wiebke Radeny, Maren A.O. Mutie, Ianetta Quirós, Carlos F. Herrero, Mario Ndungu, Anthony Ndiwa, Nicholas N. Mango, Joash Claessens, Lieven Rufino, Mariana C. agriculture household food security farmers gender climate change food security Background What are the key factors that contribute to household-level food security? What lessons can we learn from food secure households? What agricultural options and management strategies are likely to benefit female-headed households in particular? This paper addresses these questions using a unique dataset of 600 households that allows us to explore a wide range of indicators capturing different aspects of performance and well-being for different types of households—female-headed, male-headed, food secure, food insecure—and assess livelihoods options and strategies and how they influence food security. The analysis is based on a detailed farm household survey carried out in three sites in Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania. Results Our results suggest that food insecurity may not be more severe for female-headed households than male-headed households. We found that food secure farming households have a wider variety of crops on their farms and are more market oriented than are the food insecure. More domestic assets do not make female-headed households more food secure. For the other categories of assets (livestock, transport, and productive), we did not find evidence of a correlation with food security. Different livelihood portfolios are being pursued by male versus female-headed households, with female-headed households less likely to grow high-value crops and more likely to have a less diversified crop portfolio. Conclusions These findings help identify local, national and regional policies and actions for enhancing food security of female-headed as well as male-headed households. These include interventions that improve households’ access to information, e.g., though innovative communication and knowledge-sharing efforts and support aimed at enhancing women’s and men’s agricultural market opportunities. 2015-12 2015-12-15T09:04:52Z 2015-12-15T09:04:52Z Journal Article https://hdl.handle.net/10568/69239 en Open Access application/pdf Springer Silvestri S, Douxchamps S, Kristjanson P, Förch W, Radeny M, Mutie I, Quiros CF, Herrero M, Ndungu A, Ndiwa N, Mango J, Claessens L, Rufino CM. 2015. Households and food security: lessons from food secure households in East Africa. Agriculture & Food Security 4:23.
spellingShingle agriculture
household food security
farmers
gender
climate change
food security
Silvestri, Silvia
Douxchamps, Sabine
Kristjanson, Patricia M.
Förch, Wiebke
Radeny, Maren A.O.
Mutie, Ianetta
Quirós, Carlos F.
Herrero, Mario
Ndungu, Anthony
Ndiwa, Nicholas N.
Mango, Joash
Claessens, Lieven
Rufino, Mariana C.
Households and food security: lessons from food secure households in East Africa
title Households and food security: lessons from food secure households in East Africa
title_full Households and food security: lessons from food secure households in East Africa
title_fullStr Households and food security: lessons from food secure households in East Africa
title_full_unstemmed Households and food security: lessons from food secure households in East Africa
title_short Households and food security: lessons from food secure households in East Africa
title_sort households and food security lessons from food secure households in east africa
topic agriculture
household food security
farmers
gender
climate change
food security
url https://hdl.handle.net/10568/69239
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