Center for Chronic Disease Control, Public Health Foundation of India, Gurgaon, India.
School of Public Health, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI, United States of America.
PLoS One. 2020 Apr 16;15(4):e0231107. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0231107. eCollection 2020.
This paper investigated whether there are any regional-level differences in factors associated with farmer household dietary diversity using the Food Consumption Score (FCS), in two states of India: Haryana and Gujarat. Our results suggest that the factors associated with farmer household dietary diversity were region-specific, with diverse drivers across districts. For example, in Vadodara (Gujarat), farmers who had greater crop diversity and planted more cash crops had higher dietary diversity while large landholders in Bhavnagar (Gujarat) had higher dietary diversity. In Karnal (Haryana), more educated farmer households and those who cultivated large landholdings had higher dietary diversity while farmers in Bhiwani (Haryana) who were more educated and sold more crops to market had higher dietary diversity. Thus, factors associated with FCS differed even within the same state. These results suggest that in some regions of India, higher crop diversity and better education could improve farmer household dietary diversity. On the other hand, in some other regions, dietary diversity is best improved through the income generation pathway, where households that earn increased income from selling more crops were able to purchase more diverse food from markets. Our study suggests that the drivers of household dietary diversity across rural India are complex and heterogeneous; thus, future policies and programs to improve farmer household nutrition should be tailored considering regional differences in the factors associated with household nutrition.
本文调查了印度的哈里亚纳邦和古吉拉特邦这两个邦，在与农民家庭饮食多样性相关的因素方面是否存在区域性差异，采用了食物消费得分（FCS）。研究结果表明，与农民家庭饮食多样性相关的因素具有区域性，不同地区的驱动因素也不同。例如，在古吉拉特邦的巴罗达（Vadodara），种植作物种类更多、种植更多经济作物的农民饮食多样性更高，而古吉拉特邦的巴夫那加尔（Bhavnagar）的大土地所有者饮食多样性更高。在哈里亚纳邦的卡尔纳尔（Karnal），受教育程度更高和拥有较大土地的农民家庭饮食多样性更高，而哈里亚纳邦的比瓦尼（Bhiwani）的农民受教育程度更高、将更多作物出售到市场的农民饮食多样性更高。因此，即使在同一个邦内，与 FCS 相关的因素也存在差异。这些结果表明，在印度的一些地区，更高的作物多样性和更好的教育可以提高农民家庭的饮食多样性。另一方面，在其他一些地区，通过创造收入的途径可以最好地改善饮食多样性，那些通过出售更多作物获得更多收入的家庭能够从市场购买更多种类的食物。本研究表明，印度农村家庭饮食多样性的驱动因素是复杂和异质的；因此，未来改善农民家庭营养的政策和计划应考虑到与家庭营养相关因素的地区差异进行调整。
