Household dietary diversity indicators in rural Central America

Abstract

ObjectiveFANTA (2006) and FAO (2012) proposed household dietary diversity scores (HDDS) derived from minimal food consumption data. D'Errico et al (2016) proposed the Shannon‐Wiener and Simpson indices applied to HDDS for food security resilience. WFP (2008) proposed a Food Consumption Score (FCS) weighting HDDS by number of days in a week food was consumed and nutritional importance. This paper proposes new HDDS weighted by utilization coefficients (HDDSU), by nutrient content (HDDSN) and by both (HDDSUN).MethodsThe data on food consumption from 702 households were collected for a seven‐day period in bordering rural communities of El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras and Nicaragua in 2013, 2014 and 2015. HDDS and new scores HDDSU, HDDSN and HDDSUN for FAO, FANTA and WFP considered 16, 12 and nine food groups respectively and nine for WFP‐FCS with relative nutritional weights only. HDDS and new scores distributions for FAO, FANTA and WFP, and WFP FCS with relative nutritional weights only were estimated as well as correlations between food energy and all scores.ResultsHDDS, HDDSU, HDDSE and HDDSUE distributions based on FAO and FANTA food groupings were similar for small number of food groups consumed, while those based on WFP food groupings behaved differently. Main food groups identified by HDDS were ten in 16 for FAO, ten in 12 for FANTA HDDS, and all nine for WFP; while by FCS, HDDSU, HDDSE and HDDSUE scores identified fewer important food groups for FAO, FANTA and WFP dietary diversity. The correlations between energy intake and dietary diversity scores for FAO, FANTA and WFP were close, ranging from 0.28 to 0.35.ConclusionsIn rural populations of bordering communities in Central America, New scores HDDSU, HDDSE, and HDDSUE provided better results for assessing household dietary diversity than HDDS scores. The new scores weighting by utilization coefficients (HDDSU), nutrient content (HDDSE for example food energy), and both (HDDSUE) identified better the importance of food groups for food and nutrition security. Correlations between dietary energy intake and all household dietary diversity scores analysed were very similar. Policy implications refer to the promotion of main food groups and enhancing potential food groups identified by new scores for improving household dietary diversity in vulnerable populations.