From Farm to Nutrition: Connecting the Dots between Dimensions of Food Security and Child’s Nutritional Wellbeing in India Using Panel Data Analysis

Anjali Sharma , International Institute for Population Sciences (IIPS)

Sustainable Development Goal 2 aims to eliminate hunger by 2030, but this cannot be achieved without addressing undernutrition in the early years of life. Therefore, this study examines the linkage between each dimension of food security and nutritional well-being among children in India. Using panel data from the Young Lives Survey (2006–2016), conducted in Andhra Pradesh and Telangana, India, this study introduces a novel method to construct the dimensions of food security and applied fixed-effects panel regression, dynamic structural equation model, regression-based and KHB decomposition models. Food availability is composed by integrating the data on district level crops and ICMR recommended dietary allowances as well as NSDP by agriculture and allied activities. Food accessibility is created using self-rated food accessibility and purchasing power. Food utilisation is composed of WASH and Dietary diversity score. Appropriate weights were given. Results show that a one unit increase in availability and accessibility is significantly associated with a 0.81 kg/m² rise in BMI, while utilisation contributes 0.17 kg/m². Decomposition reveals accessibility (46%) as the largest driver of BMI change, followed by availability (38%) and utilisation (17%) between 2006 and 2016, with the latter's contribution increasing. This study underscores the need for integrated policy frameworks that target all dimensions of food security as interconnected drivers of child’s nutritional wellbeing.

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 Presented in Session 29. Flash Session Child and Adolescent Health and Development