HOUSEHOLD FOOD INSECURITY AND COPING STRATEGIES: THE CASE OF KINDO DIDAYE DISTRICT, WOLAITA ZONE, SOUTHERN ETHIOPIA.

Abstract

A better understanding of factors affecting the status of food security at micro level is required for the organization of technical research, the development of policies and for shaping the direction of action for food security. Consequently, this study is expected to generate ideas that would be useful to reveal the seriousness of the problem and identify the determinants of household food security. To this end, investigation of the demographic and socioeconomic characteristics of food secure and food insecure groups of farmers; identification and examination of major causes of food insecurity and measuring food security status of households; identification as to what kinds of the households are more food insecure or secure; as well as assessment and analysis of the local coping strategies of the households in the district was made in this study. With existence of high annual variability in food production mainly due to unpredictable climatic conditions coupled with expanding human population and the lack of access to off-farm opportunity the household food security status is worsening in the study area. This study was therefore, envisaged to assess the magnitude of food insecurity at household level and to identify local coping strategies practiced in the district. In order to achieve these objectives demographic and socio-economic data were collected from 160 randomly selected households in Kindo Didaye District of Wolaita Zone SNNPRG. A two-step sampling procedure was used to select 4 PAs. A survey was conducted to collect the primary data from sample respondents. Supplementary, secondary data were collected from various sources. Univariate analysis such as T-test and Chi-square tests were also used to describe characteristics of food secure and food insecure groups. The survey result shows that about 72.9% of sample farmers were food insecure. A logistic regression model was fitted to analyze the potential variables affecting household food insecurity in the study area. Among 14 explanatory variables included in the logistic model, 9 of them were significant at less than 10% probability level. These were family size, number of oxen owned, use of chemical fertilizer, size of cultivated land, farm credit use, total annual income per adult equivalent, food consumption expenditure, livestock owned, and off-farm income per adult equivalent.