Empowering Women, Nourishing Generation: Deciphering India's Child Nutrition Landscape from 2006 to 2021

Bharti Singh , PhD Scholar at International Institute for Population Sciences (IIPS)

This study attempts to bridge women's empowerment and the new generation's health. The objective is to investigate the impact of women's empowerment on child nutrition outcomes in India from 2006 to 2021. Rooted in the backdrop of entrenched patriarchal norms, women's empowerment has emerged as a driving force for societal transformation, echoing Kofi Annan's assertion that "there is no tool for development more effective than empowering women". This study has used the recent three rounds of the NFHS (2005–06, 2015–16, and 2019–21). A composite index of women's empowerment, encompassing five domains (decision-making, attitude towards violence, freedom of movement, sexual rights, and financial independence), was constructed using principle component analysis. Further, binary logistic regression and decomposition analysis are used to analyse the relationship, contribution, and disparity of the factors affecting undernutrition among children in India. Results of the preliminary analysis revealed that, while empowerment in a singular domain proves insufficient in combating child undernutrition, the pivotal role of freedom of movement emerges as a notable exception (OR = 0.91; p<0.027). The constructed empowerment index emerges as a crucial determinant. The logistic regression shows that after adjusting the child level (OR = 0.84; p<0.000), mother level (OR = 0.92; p<0.021), and household level (OR = 0.89; p<0.002), the effect of women's empowerment on children's undernourishment has been significant. Children whose mothers have high empowerment demonstrate a significantly lower likelihood of experiencing undernutrition than those whose mothers have low empowerment.

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 Presented in Session 78. Nutrition and Metabolism Disorders