Gender Differences in Nutritional Intake among Rural-Urban Migrants in China.

Qian Sun,Xiaoyun Li,Dil Bahadur Rahut

doi:10.3390/ijerph18189821

Abstract

Due to rapid economic growth and urbanization, China has witnessed massive migration from rural to urban areas and significant changes in food habits and nutritional intake. This paper empirically examines the factors affecting nutritional intake of 7752 rural-urban migrants and its gender effects, using the China Health and Nutrition Survey (CHNS) data from 1991 to 2011. The descriptive results show that female migrants (FMs) have lower energy intake but have higher proportions of energy from protein and fat than male migrants (MMs), indicating that FMs have a better nutritional quality. The regression results show that the calorie-income elasticities are 0.014 for MMs and 0.018 for FMs. A remarkable positive effect of income on nutritional quality is found for FMs. Employment in non-farm sectors and the community environmental sanitation have a significant increase in calorie intake and nutritional quality, while non-farm employment presents a negative and significant effect on FMs’ calorie intake. Modern market significantly positively affects migrants’ energy intake from protein, thereby improving their nutritional quality. The exogenous switching treatment effect regression results display a significant gender effect on energy intake and its share from protein for migrants, while there is no significant gender effect when it comes to the share of energy from fat.

Highlights

Ensuring that all people, those most likely to be affected by food insecurity and malnutrition, have equal access to affordable and nutritious food is crucial for human health and welfare
The per capita daily energy intake of male migrants (MMs) is 2412.49 kcal compared to 2003.51 kcal for female migrants (FMs), which is basically within the range of 1600~2400 kcal recommended by the Chinese Dietary
The gender differences in sprotn would have been increased moderately to 0.08%. Under both counterfactual conditions, the results demonstrate that MMs have relatively better energy intake than FMs, and the gender gap would be narrowed to a certain extent for rural-urban migrants

Summary

Introduction

Those most likely to be affected by food insecurity and malnutrition, have equal access to affordable and nutritious food is crucial for human health and welfare. Sociodemographic characteristics, such as gender, age, education, wealth, and geographic location, show marked differences in nutritional outcomes and malnutrition inequalities [1]. The prevalence of overweight (BMI ≥ 25) and obesity (BMI ≥ 30) among adults aged 18 and over was 39.2% and 15.1% for women in 2016 compared with 38.5%. Women had a higher prevalence of being underweight (BMI ≤ 18.5).

Methods

Results

Discussion

Conclusion