Abstract
AbstractSchool feeding programs have served as go‐to policies for addressing child malnutrition in both developed and developing countries. While an increasing number of studies have investigated the health consequences of school feeding programs, empirical evidence regarding their effects on children's health inequality remains limited. This study examines the impact of China's Nutrition Improvement Program (NIP)—A program that provides free meals for rural students at the compulsory education stage—on rural children's health status and urban–rural health status differentials. The analysis uses data from the 2004–2015 China Health and Nutrition Survey. Leveraging county‐by‐county rollouts of the program, we employ difference‐in‐differences approaches as our identification strategy. The results show that the NIP significantly improves children's height‐for‐age z‐scores by 0.136 standard deviations. Moreover, we find that the NIP alleviates the inequality of opportunity in health between urban and rural children by 21.6% in pilot counties. These findings are robust to a series of validity checks. The effect is more pronounced among students who have a younger age, and live in low social status families. Our findings suggest that school feeding programs are effective in decreasing child malnutrition levels and reducing urban‐rural inequality in the long run. [EconLit citations: I10, I18, D63].
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Disclaimer: All third-party content on this website/platform is and will remain the property of their respective owners and is provided on "as is" basis without any warranties, express or implied. Use of third-party content does not indicate any affiliation, sponsorship with or endorsement by them. Any references to third-party content is to identify the corresponding services and shall be considered fair use under The CopyrightLaw.