The effects of farmer access to credit on dietrary diversity in Zambia.
Date
2020
Authors
Shiyenge, Mambwe
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
The University of Zambia
Abstract
Farmer access to credit is one of the financial solutions for addressing malnutrition, having
been extensively researched in several countries with multiple studies concluding that access
to credit has the potential to improve a smallholder household’s dietary diversity and ultimately
reduce malnutrition. However, limited literature exists to clarify this association in Zambia. To
address the knowledge gap and understand this association. The study examined how farmer
access to credit affects Zambia’s dietary diversity. The study used an instrumental variable
approach where Loan society membership and the Headman/Headwoman’s relation to the
household head are instrumental variables on data collected from the Rural Agricultural
Livelihood Survey (RALS) of 2015, which covered 7934 agricultural households from 10
provinces. The results indicate that smallholder household’s that accessed credit consumed at
a significantly higher dietary diversity compared to otherwise, with a difference of 0.352units
at a p-value=0.040. However, these results are limited to smallholder households that are also
likely to receive FISP. At the same time, education attainment to secondary and tertiary levels
lowered a household’s dietary diversity than no years spent in formal education with a
significant difference of 0.119 and 0.221units, respectively. At a p-value=0.013 for secondary
education and p-value=0.004 for tertiary education attainment. The study suggests that access
to agricultural credit can improve a household’s dietary diversity. Whereas increasing the
number of families pursuing higher education attainment enhances the household’s nutritional
awareness and preference to consume various food groups. The study further suggests that
measures to promote the financial inclusion of smallholder farmers in agricultural credit are
crucial. Though further research is needed to identify the long term effect of credit access on
household dietary diversity.
Description
Thesis
Keywords
Agriculture and state--Zambia. , Farmer Input Support Programme--Zambia.