The Status and Determinants of Food Security among Rural Households in Bahar County, Hamadan Province

Document Type : Research Paper

Authors

1 MSc. Graduated, Department of Agricultural Education and Extension, Faculty of Agriculture, Bu-Ali Sina University, Hamedan, Iran.

2 Assistant Professor, Department of Agricultural Education and Extension, Faculty of Agriculture, Bu-Ali Sina University, Hamedan, Iran.

3 Associated professor, Department of Agricultural Education and Extension, Faculty of Agriculture, Bu-Ali Sina University, Hamedan, Iran.

Abstract

Food security is a challenge of the coming decades and the research necessity of today’s world. This study aimed to identify the status and factors affecting the food security of rural households in Bahar County. The statistical population of the study included all rural households’ heads in Bahar County (N = 1100) in which the number of 388 ones was estimated as a statistical sample using the Morgan table and selected through stratified sampling according to both criteria of population and geographical area. The standard questionnaire of Cornell was used to assess food security. The results showed that 51.8% of the study population were in secure conditions and 48.2% were in insecure food conditions. About 9.3% of rural households experienced food insecurity with severe hunger, and most of them lived in the western villages of Bahar County. The results also showed that food security has a significant, positive correlation with economic and personal factors such as education level, agricultural and non-agricultural income, and agricultural and horticultural area under cultivation, while showing negative correlation with geographical and social factors such as distance from the village to city and household size. The results of multiple regression also showed that income from agricultural activities was the strongest predictor of food security among rural households in Bahar County, followed by income from non-agricultural activities, the number of employed people among a household and the number of dependents respectively. As a result, income diversification can be a suitable mechanism for improving the food security of rural households.

Keywords

References

Alizadeh, K., & Hasheminejad, H. (2012). Investigating the Effect of Economic Conditions on Food Security in Rural Areas (Case Study: Low Volunteer Village of Razavi District of Mashhad). Scientific-Research Quarterly of Geographical Data (SEPEHR), 21(82), 85-88.
Allameh, A. A. (2012). Food security, sustainable agricultural development, health. The first national conference on strategies for achieving sustainable development.
Asgharian Dastenaii, A., Karami, E., &  Keshavarz, M. (2013): Determinants of Rural Households' Food Security, Agricultural Economics, 7 (1): 87-109.
Bakhshudeh, M., Jafari Thani, M. (2008). "Study of spatial distribution of poverty and food insecurity of urban and rural households by province in Iran", Agricultural Economics and Development, 16(61),  103- 123.
Bashir, M. K., Schilizzi, S., & Pandit, R. (2012): The determinants of rural household food security in the Punjab, Pakistan: an econometric analysis. Working Paper No.122526, School of Agricultural and Resource Economics, University of Western Australia, Crawley, Australia.
Bickel, G., Nord, M., Price, C., Hamilton, W., & Cook, J. (2000): Guide to Measuring Household Food Security, United States Department of Agriculture, Available in: http://www.fns.usda.gov/guide-measuring-household-food-security-revised-2000.
Bogale, A. (2012). Vulnerability of smallholder rural households to food insecurity in Eastern Ethiopia. Food Security 4 (4), 581–591.
Cheraghi, M., Kazemi, N. (2018). Food safety and related economic factors in elderly rural women, Koomesh Quarterly. 20(2), 203-209.
Clapp, J., Moseley, W. G., Burlingame, B., & Termine, P. (2021). The case for a six-dimensional food security framework. Food Policy, 102164.
Dzanku, F. M. (2019). Food security in rural sub-Saharan Africa: Exploring the nexus between gender, geography and off-farm employment. World Development, 113, 26-43.
Esmailifar, A. (2014): The role of food security in national security, Economic trend journal, 63, 40-44.
Fallahi, E., Shokri Jokar, S., & Ghazi, Sh. (2017). The ways and means of Food Security provided and its position in passive defense. yafte. 19 (3), 41-48.
Goli, S., Rammohan, A., & Reddy, S. P. (2021). The interaction of household agricultural landholding and Caste on food security in rural Uttar Pradesh, India. Food Security, 13(1), 219-237.
Heydari, M., Yousefi, A., Rostami, F. & Hosseini Sedigh, S.M. (2020). Agro-climate Zoning of Saffron Cultivation in Hamedan Province: An Approach to Change the Pattern of Cultivation, Geography and Environmental Planning, 30(4), 99-114..
Jamin, D., Amini, A., Qader Marzi, H., & Tavakoli, C. (2017). Assessing food security and analyzing its challenges in rural areas (Case study: Badr village, Ravansar city). Quarterly Journal of Regional Planning,7(27), 87-102.
Kazemi, M., First Builders, M., & Gorbani. (2016). Quantitative analysis of food security in Khorasan Razavi province based on potato production. Applied Agricultural Research, 29(3), 63-75.
Leonard, T., Hughes, A. E., Donegan, C., Santillan, A., & Pruitt, S. L. (2018). Overlapping geographic clusters of food security and health: Where do social determinants and health outcomes converge in the US?. SSM-population health, 5, 160-170.
Mabhaudhi, T., Chibarabada, T. P., Chimonyo, V. G. P., Murugani, V. G., Pereira, L. M., Sobratee, N., ... & Modi, A. T. (2019). Mainstreaming underutilized indigenous and traditional crops into food systems: A South African perspective. Sustainability, 11(1), 172.
Mehrabi Basharabadi, H., & Ohadi. V. (2014). Investigating the factors affecting food security in Iran. Agricultural Economics, 8, 111-121.
Mokhtari, A., & Esmailian E. (2014). Food Security in Iran: Solutions and Barriers, Third National Conference on Food Science and Industry, Quchan, Islamic Azad University, Quchan Branch.
Naderi Mahdi, K., Jalilian, S.(2016). Investigation of food insecurity and some factors affecting it in rural women heads of households in West Islamabad. Rural Research and Planning. 5(2) (14), 29- 45.
National Statistics Center of Iran. (2016). https://www.amar.org.ir
Nkomoki, W., Bavorová, M., & Banout, J. (2019). Factors associated with household food security in Zambia. Sustainability, 11(9), 2715.
Nord, M., Coleman-Jensen, A., Andrews, M., & Carlson, S. (2010). Household Food Security in the United States 2009, U.S. Dept. of Agriculture, Econ. Res. Serv. November 2010.
Omotayo, A. O., & Aremu, A. O. (2020). Evaluation of factors influencing the inclusion of indigenous plants for food security among rural households in the North West Province of South Africa. Sustainability, 12(22), 9562.
Ramakrishna, G., & Demeke, A. (2002). An empirical analysis of food insecurity in Ethiopia: the case of North Wello. Africa Development/Afrique et Développement, 127-143.
Rostami. F, Shahmoradi, M., & Baghaei, S. (2015). Factors affecting on rural household's food security (Case study: Karnachy Village in Kermanshah County), Iranian Journal of Agricultural Economics and Development, 45(4), 725-737.
Saadi, H., Azizi, M., & Azami, M. (2014). Extension training and food security of farming families (Case study: Qorveh city). Iran Agricultural Economics and Development Research, 45(3), 483- 499.
Safarkhanlu, A., & Mohammadinejad, A. (2011). Investigating the effect of bread waste on poverty line and food security index of urban and rural households in Iran during 2001-2007. Agricultural Economics and Development, 19(75), 53-78.
Savari, M., Shaban Ali Fami, H., Daneshvar Ameri, J. (2014). Food security and its greater impact on the rural community of Diwandara city. Rural Research, 5(2), 311-332.
Savari, M., Sheykhi, H., & Amghani, M. S. (2020). The role of educational channels in the motivating of rural women to improve household food security. One Health, 10, 100150.
Seydaei, E., Ghanbari, Y., Jamini, D., & Boshagh, M. (2013). Measuring the Agricultural Sustainability in Rural Areas- A Case Study: Rural Areas of Central District of Ravansar Township, Geology and environmental sustainability, 3(1)(6), 87- 106.
Seyedhamzeh, Sh., & Damari, B. (2017). Conceptual Model of Food Security and Nutrition in Iran, Journal of Social Health, 4(3), 228-237.
Shakoori, A. (2004). "Food security and access to it in Iran", Letter of Social Sciences, 24. 160-133.
Upton, J. B., Cissé, J. D., & Barrett, C. B. (2016). Food security as resilience: Reconciling definition and measurement. Agricultural economics, 47(S1), 135-147.
Zahedi Mazandarani, M.J. (2005). Rural Poverty in Iran: Trend And Measurment (The Explanation Of Methods And The Critic Of Approaches). Social Welfare, 4(17): 289-326.
Zamani, L., & Javaherian, Z. (2015). An exploration of changes in the international sustainability index. Journal of Environmental Science and Technology, 17(4), 181-200‏.
Zhou, D., Shah, T., Ali, S., Ahmad, W., Din, I. U., & Ilyas, A. (2019). Factors affecting household food security in rural northern hinterland of Pakistan. Journal of the Saudi Society of Agricultural Sciences, 18(2), 201-210.
Journal of Rural Research
Volume 13, Issue 2
September 2022
Pages 298-313

Files

History

  • Receive Date: 01 October 2021
  • Revise Date: 25 January 2022
  • Accept Date: 04 February 2022

Share

How to cite

Statistics