Investment in Physical infrastructure will improve nutrition, gender equality –study

Findings from recent International Centre for Evaluation and Development (ICED) research have revealed that insufficient infrastructure is hampering nutrition, women’s economic empowerment and gender equity.

The study established this among low-income consumers in rural areas of low- and middle-income countries of South East Asia and sub-Saharan Africa.

As such, the research highlighted an urgent need to invest in physical infrastructure to improve economic development outcomes among women.

Using a variety of methods, the two-year project (2022-2023) compiled, collected and synthesised evidence on the impact of different types of physical infrastructure (production, post-production, markets, information) on nutritious diets, women’s economic empowerment and gender equity, while also noting the existing evidence-gaps.

The research’s goal was to increase understanding of the role that infrastructure plays in improving access to and affordability of diets and empowering rural women – bearing in mind the challenge of seasonality and its effects on diets among low-income consumers in developing countries.

More importantly, the project also sought to improve understanding on the pathways connecting infrastructural development to diets, markets and women’s economic empowerment in the literature.

Findings

The study’s findings revealed that residing in a community with Internet cafés, information communication technology centres and community radios results in higher vitamin A, protein and iron-rich food intake respectively, but the effect of Internet cafés on nutritious diet intake appears to be lower in magnitudes compared to the treatment effects of other information infrastructure.

Regarding women’s economic empowerment, the results show that living in a community with information infrastructure significantly increases the average empowerment index and gender parity index.

“It also revealed that in the untreated state, farm households were observed to be consuming significantly lower vitamin A, protein and iron-rich foods compared to non-farm households. However, the presence of information infrastructure allows farm households to at least catch-up in nutritious diet intake with the non-farm households.

“But more importantly, an expansion in electricity increases the impact of information infrastructure on nutritious diet intake and women’s economic empowerment per household; which is suggestive of an enabling environment’s importance,” a summary of the study stated.

It holds that investment in physical infrastructure will improve livelihoods, including allowing for the consumption of nutritious diets. For instance, access to roads will reduce travel time, creating job opportunities and increased consumption of diverse foods for low-income consumers.

Similarly, energy infrastructure such as electricity will reduce the burden of using ‘dirty fuel’ and airborne pollution, thereby reducing cooking time and enhancing the quality of life for women in developing countries.

Way forward

In an interview with the B&FT, Senior Lecturer at the Department of Agricultural Economics and Agribusiness, University of Ghana, and Research Associate at ICED, Charles Yaw Okyere, said the study at hand underscores the importance for developing countries to on our own invest in physical infrastructure and promote research capacity through the necessary funding and support.

“Based on that, we decided to do this research to show how these linkages connect. One key challenge, we argue strongly in this study, is that there have been limited frameworks that try to explore these linkages.

“And some analyses have shown that, for instance, these researches are being led by people in the global North and not those in the global South – all due to challenges associated with funding,” he said.

For his part, President and CEO-ICED, Dr. David Sarfo Ameyaw, said the country must be guided by the evidence provided so it strategically targets investment in infrastructure. He cited that there are a lot of women trading on the roads, but road construction plans do not consider building markets along vantage spots to boost their businesses.

“Achieving gender equality and empowering women is not just a moral imperative but also a strategic necessity for sustainable infrastructure development. Numerous studies have demonstrated the social and financial advantages of improving gender equality and empowering women.

“In particular, it is estimated that approximately US$28trillion could be added to the annual global GDP in 2025 by achieving equal participation of women and men in the economy. Ensuring equal access to infrastructure services is a critical step to closing the gender gap,” Prof. Kwaku Appiah-Adu noted.

ICED

The International Centre for Evaluation and Development (ICED) is an independent, African-owned and African-led think-tank that works to use the outputs of evaluation in contributing to and enhancing development outcomes and impacts – concentrating on Africa, where the need for its expertise is greatest.

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