Human Resource Economics

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Determinants of the Nutrition and Health Status of Children in Rural Ethiopia: A Longitudinal Analysis
(A.A.U, 2006-07) Ayalew, Daniel; Woldehanna, Tassew (Dr.)
This study tried to see the determinants of nutritional status of children using longitudinal data from fifteen villages of rural Ethiopia. An attempt was also made to see if there are any significant interactions between mother's education and community characteristics. By employing random effects procedure, both height-for-age and weight for- height z-scores were regressed on various private and public determinants The results show that age of the child, parental height and primary education, existence of permanent partner to the household head, household size and composition, and safe water source of the household are an important determinants of child nutritional outcomes. However, most of the interaction terms between mother's education and community variables (such as access to healthcare and the communities' safe source of water) failed to be significant implying partly the unimportance of these community variables and partly the low level of maternal education in the sampled households. But for the significant term in the WHZ regression (i.e the interaction between access to health care and mother's attainment of at least a year of primary education but not higher), one may argue that having at least a year of primary education is a substitute to access to health care.