Women Empowerment Index Research Articles

Forty Years after Poverty Reduction in China: The Role of Women's Empowerment in Enhancing Food Security and Diet Diversity.

This study analyzed the role of women's empowerment in diversifying the diet of households through their own production. Developed from empowerment and food security theories, this study constructed measures from the household dietary diversity score (HDDS) and Women's Empowerment Index (WEI). The study focused on poverty-stricken regions in China and conducted a thematic questionnaire-based household survey on gender and food consumption in 2021. Based on micro-level evidence from 1199 rural households, this research found a low score of women's empowerment and an average WEI of 0.689; the status of diet diversity, measured by the HDDS, varied by income and social class; and the average rate was low. Agricultural production diversity and women's empowerment are positively associated with diet diversity. There is strong evidence that women's employment mitigates the side effects of decreasing production diversity on households' diet security. As a result, women's empowerment can potentially mitigate the adverse consequences of low agricultural diversification in household diet quality in less developed areas. This study provides evidence for repurposing food and agricultural policies toward healthy diets and gender-responsive agrifood systems.

Women's empowerment, children's nutritional status, and the mediating role of household headship structure: Evidence from sub-Saharan Africa.

We aimed to examine the association between women's empowerment and childhood nutritional status while accounting for the mediating role of household headship structure. Cross-country, cross-sectional quantitative data from the most recent Demographic and Health Surveys (2015-2018) were used. Women's empowerment was measured as a composite index of participation in household decision-making, attitude towards domestic violence, and asset ownership. Childhood nutrition status was measure as anaemia (haemoglobin concentration < 110g/L), stunting (height-for-age z-scorescore <-2) and the co-occurrence of anaemia and stunting. Applying the Lewbel two-stage least squares, women's migration status was used as an instrumental variable. We used data on 25,665 woman-child dyads from eight sub-Saharan African countries: Burundi (2016), Ethiopia (2016), Guinea (2018), Malawi (2016), Mali (2018), Zimbabwe (2015), Uganda (2016), and Tanzania (2015). The women were in their reproductive ages (15-49 years) and children were under 5 years old. The findings showed that an increase in women's empowerment index reduces children's likelihood of being anaemic and having a co-occurrence of anaemia and stunting [coeff (SE), -0.114 (0.025) and -0.072 (0.032), respectively]. Specifically, an increase in asset ownership or decision-making dimensions of empowerment significantly reduces the likelihood of anaemia and the co-occurrence of anaemia and stunting among children. Children of empowered women from male-headed households were more likely to be anaemic and be concurrently anaemic and stunted compared to their counterparts whose mothers were from female-headed households. Interventions designed to improve childhood nutrition through women's empowerment approaches need to consider asset ownership and instrumental agency of women while acknowledging the mediating effect of household headship typology.

Family Planning Decision in the Context of Women Empowerment: Case of a Middle-income Economy

Family planning is essential for sustainable development, particularly for a lower middle income country like Pakistan, the fifth most densely inhabited country in the world. Women's empowerment leads to a dynamic role in family planning decisions. Based on the data of PDHS 2017-18 and by taking a sample of 12339 married women, this study aims to explore the connection between women empowerment and family planning decisions in Pakistan. A summative women empowerment index was calculated for the five dimensions (economic empowerment, financial inclusion, participation in decision making, self-esteem, and awareness status). Findings of binary logistics showed that women's empowerment (as an index) has a positive effect on the use of contraceptives. Every dimension of women's empowerment except her financial inclusion positively affects family planning decisions. Household wealth status increases the probability of using contraceptives. Due to regional disparities, contraceptive usage is shallow in Sindh, Balochistan, AJK, and FATA.

Women's multidimensional empowerment index and essential newborn care practice in Bangladesh: The mediating role of skilled antenatal care follow-ups.

The World Health Organization recommended a set of five neonatal care practices that are most essential for good health of a newborn. As good essential newborn care (ENC) practice reduces the risk of neonatal morbidity and mortality, this paper focuses how women's multidimensional empowerment index is associated with this practice through the skilled antenatal care. To the best of knowledge, no such study has been conducted yet. The composite index of women's multidimensional empowerments was constructed using family decision, intimate partner violence, social status, healthcare access and economic status of women; and skilled antenatal care was defined if a pregnant woman received eight or more checkups during pregnancy from skilled health professionals. Data extracted from Bangladesh Demographic and Health Survey, 2017-18 have been utilized in the study. A total of 2441 mothers have been considered who delivered their last live birth at home within three years preceding the survey. A mediation analysis was performed considering the structural equation modeling to find out the adjusted association of women's empowerment on both skilled antenatal care and good ENC practice, but the unadjusted associations were also checked using a chi-square test. To test the indirect as well as total effect of women's empowerment through skilled antenatal care on good ENC practice, bias-corrected standard errors were estimated using a bootstrapping sampling. Good ENC practice was considerably low in Bangladesh with 7.6% of newborns receiving the practice. Both adjusted and unadjusted analyses showed the significant association of women's empowerment with both skilled antenatal care and good ENC practice. The study revealed that the indirect effect of high empowerment through skilled antenatal care was greater than its direct effect on good ENC practice. This study explored that the prevalence of good ENC practice can be accelerated through women's empowerment, where skilled antenatal care plays an important mediating role in improving good ENC practice among highly empowered mothers. The study suggests that a woman should follow the latest guidelines recommended by WHO for antenatal care follow-up. Policymakers can modify some of the maternal and child health care interventions based on the research findings.

Empowering Absence? Assessing the Impact of Transnational Male Out-Migration on Left behind Wives

Experiences of left-behind family members of transnational migrant workers have been in the shadow of academic discourse on migration. To contribute to the slowly growing body of literature, this study explores the impact of male out-migration on left-behind wives. The study proposes and applies a novel framework to estimate Women Empowerment Index (WEI) for comparing the empowerment level across households with and without men in transnational labor. Cross-sectional surveys and unstructured interviews were used to collect data from 373 respondents from three selected areas in Nepal. Results indicate that left-behind wives experience a higher degree of decision-making authority, physical mobility, and involvement in socio-political spheres compared to women with husbands at home. However, left behind wives were found to experience increased unpaid workload and decreased access to information, together with emotional and psychological costs in the absence of their husbands.

Determinants of Women Empowerment in Bishoftu Town; Oromia Regional State of Ethiopia

The purpose of this study was to determine the status of women's empowerment and its determinants using women's asset endowment and decision-making potential as indicators. To determine representative sample size, this study used a two-stage sampling technique, and 122 sample respondents were selected at random. To analyze the data in this study, descriptive statistics and a probit model were used. The average women's empowerment index was 0.41, indicating a relatively lower status of women's empowerment in the study area. According to the study's findings, only 40.9% of women were empowered, while the remaining 59.1% were not. The probit model results show that women's access to the media, women's income, and their husbands' education status have a significant and positive impact on the status of women's empowerment, while the family size of households has a negative impact. As a result, it is important to enhance women's access to the media and income, promote family planning and contraception, and improve men's educational status in order to improve the status of women's empowerment.

Women empowerment and access to maternity and reproductive healthcare in Pakistan: cross-validation of a Survey-based Index in Afghanistan (SWEI-A)

BackgroundDespite the obvious violation of women’s rights in Pakistan and the vital necessity for women empowerment, a unified country-specific index measuring women empowerment is not yet available. This study cross-validated a survey-based women empowerment index from Afghanistan to be used in Pakistan.MethodsThe data for married Pakistani women aged 15–49 in the 2017–18 Pakistan demographic health survey was used to construct the final model using the explanatory and confirmatory factor analyses. The Cronbach’s alpha test examined the internal consistency of the developed index. To assess the convergence validity of the index, the association of each emerged domain with indicators of access to reproductive and maternity care was assessed by Poisson regression analysis adjusting for wealth index.ResultsThe final index had six domains; namely, labor force participation, attitude toward violence, decision-making, access to healthcare, literacy, age at critical life events predicting women empowerment of married Pakistani women with decent reliability (Cronbach’s α = 0.70), and validity (SRSEA&SRMR < 0.05, CFI&TLI > 0.92). The emerged domains were significantly associated with at least one of four indicators for access to reproductive and maternity care; indicative of a favorable convergence validity.ConclusionPakistan and Afghanistan are associated as brother countries with shared religious and ethnocultural identities in which women are perceived inferior to men and in critical need of empowering efforts. The results of this study reflect upon this resemblance in sociocultural structure by yielding similar domains for women's empowerment in Pakistan building upon an index previously developed for Afghan women. The developed index could inform the design of future policies, interventions, and research recognizing the important indicators of women empowerment in Pakistan and could enhance the comparability of the results across future studies.

Women Empowerment in Pakistan: Multilevel Measurements, Spatial Differences, and Contributing Factors

Based on Pakistan Demographic and Health Survey (PDHS) 2017-18 data covering a sample of 15068 currently married females aged 15-49 years, the study intends to investigate the women empowerment situation across the regions and districts of Pakistan as well as to explore the factors affecting women empowerment in Pakistan. An index of women empowerment (ranging from score 0 to 7) was constructed by taking the sum of the seven indicators on the five dimensions: woman's participation in decision making, awareness, employment, self-esteem, and financial inclusion status. The extent of women empowerment regarding each particular indicator is gauged (in percentage) at a national level as well as at regional and district levels. Regarding each particular indicator of women's empowerment, spatial differences exist across the country at the regional and district levels. At the country level, women empowerment is poor in Pakistan. Nearly 86% of respondent women said they were currently not working (unemployed). Similarly, 92% said they did not have an account in a bank or financial institution. At the same time, 57% percent of women reported that they do not own a mobile phone, 87% indicated that they never used the internet, and 40% stated that they were not watching television. At the country level, the women empowerment index's mean score was 2.14. The mean score of the women empowerment index at the regional level stood between 0.52 (in FATA) and 3.43 (in ICT), whereas at the district level, the mean score of the index stood between 0.03 (in South Waziristan) and 4.82 (in Hunza). Out of a total of 143 districts in Pakistan, in 13 districts, the mean score of the women empowerment index remained less than 1. Findings of the ordered logit regression showed that women's higher education, age, husband's higher education, household wealth status, female headship of household, number of living children, and belongingness to the urban area are positively associated with the empowerment of women.

Association of women's empowerment with anaemia and haemoglobin concentration in children in sub-Saharan Africa: A multilevel analysis.

We assessed the associations between women's empowerment and anaemia and haemoglobin concentration among children (6-59 months) in 31 sub-Saharan African (SSA) countries. We included 72,032 mother-child pairs from Demographic and Health Surveys conducted between 2006 and 2019. A three-dimensional women's empowerment index (attitude towards violence, decision makingand social independence) was constructed using principal components analysis, and associations between the index and any anaemia and Hb concentration were assessed using multilevel regression.The mean (standard deviation) haemoglobin concentration was 102.3 (16.0 g/L) and 65.8% of the children were anaemic. The odds of anaemia reduced with increasing empowerment in the dimensions of attitude towards violence [quintile (Q5) versus Q1, OR 0.77; 95% confidence interval [CI] 0.65-0.89, ptrend = 0.006], decision making (Q5 vs. Q1, OR 0.72; 95% CI 0.61-0.84, ptrend < 0.001)and social independence (Q5 vs. Q1, OR 0.86; 95% CI 0.76-0.97, ptrend = 0.015). The mean Hb concentration increased with increasing women's empowerment in the dimensions of attitude towards violence (Q5 vs. Q1, mean difference [MD] 1.40 g/L; 95% CI 0.63-2.17, ptrend < 0.001) and social independence (Q5 vs. Q1, MD 1.32 g/L; 95% CI 0.36-2.28, ptrend = 0.001). There was no evidence for a linear trend in the association between decision making and haemoglobin concentration (ptrend = 0.051).Women's empowerment was associated with reduced odds of any anaemia and higher haemoglobin concentration in children. The promotion of women's empowerment may play a role in reducing the burden of childhood anaemia in SSA.

Generating Women Empowerment Index through Principal Component Analysis

Lack of women’s empowerment is a critical aspect of gender equality but despite all government initiatives, the empowerment barrier exists in many forms and the empowerment level did not reach its anticipated level. This study attempted to generate a women empowerment index from all direct and indirect indicators related to empowerment anchored on the identity empowerment theory using Principal Component Analysis (PCA). Utilizing the data from the United Nations Development Program (UNDP), the 10 independent indicators of 145 countries were analyzed and reduced into two principal components, namely: women development and labor inclusion. Results showed that of the two extracted components, women development has the higher weight of 75% compared to labor inclusion with only 25%. Furthermore, countries that are more developed and have high development index have high empowerment index as well. Results also showed that developing countries have low human development index and low index in women empowerment. The study recommends that initiated programs and all forms of research to improve the empowerment index must put emphasis on the developing countries.

Household Microenvironment and Under-Fives Health Outcomes in Uganda: Focusing on Multidimensional Energy Poverty and Women Empowerment Indices.

Young children in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) are vulnerable to adverse effects of household microenvironments. The UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)—specifically SDG 3 through 7—urge for a comprehensive multi-sector approach to achieve the 2030 goals. This study addresses gaps in understanding the health effects of household microenvironments in resource-poor settings. It studies associations of household microenvironment variables with episodes of acute respiratory infection (ARI) and diarrhoea as well as with stunting among under-fives using logistic regression. Comprehensive data from a nationally representative, cross-sectional demographic and health survey (DHS) in Uganda were analysed. We constructed and applied the multidimensional energy poverty index (MEPI) and the three-dimensional women empowerment index in multi-variate regressions. The multidimensional energy poverty was associated with higher risk of ARI (OR = 1.32, 95% CI 1.10 to 1.58). Social independence of women was associated with lower risk of ARI (OR= 0.91, 95% CI 0.84 to 0.98), diarrhoea (OR = 0.93, 95% CI 0.88 to 0.99), and stunting (OR = 0.83, 95% CI 0.75 to 0.92). Women’s attitude against domestic violence was also significantly associated with episodes of ARI (OR = 0.88, 95% CI 0.82 to 0.93) and diarrhoea (OR = 0.89, 95% CI 0.84 to 0.93) in children. Access to sanitation facilities was associated with lower risk of ARI (OR = 0.55, 95% CI 0.45 to 0.68), diarrhoea (OR = 0.83, 95% CI 0.71 to 0.96), and stunting (OR = 0.64, 95% CI 0.49 to 0.86). Investments targeting synergies in integrated energy and water, sanitation and hygiene, and women empowerment programmes are likely to contribute to the reduction of the burden from early childhood illnesses. Research and development actions in LMICs should address and include multi-sector synergies.

Women empowerment through agricultural technology: Case study of Mymensingh-Bangladesh

In Bangladesh, attention to women empowerment through agricultural technology adoption is not new, but it has not always been acted upon accordingly. This study attempts to carry out an investigation through using both quantitative and qualitative research tools to examine the extent of women's technology adoption in agriculture and their consequent empowerment attainment in selected villages of Mymensingh sadar. To achieve the objectives of the present study, necessary data were collected by using simple random sampling technique, the study selected total of 60 women respondents. The quantitative analytical tools employed to attain the specific objectives included various descriptive statistical measures, perception index and women empowerment index by adoption technology. The results of perception index analysis indicated that majority had moderate to high favorable perception on greater extent of women's engagement in adoption agricultural technology among which may had low to moderate favorable perception on consequent empowerment attainment. The findings show that almost in all cases, decision was taken jointly by male and female. It is very satisfactory case that decision is taken by female alone particularly in the cases purchase of agricultural equipment, maintenance of agricultural equipment, motivating to use agricultural technologies, selling of old machineries. The value of average women empowerment score is 1.81, which is below from the average empowerment score 2.

Women’s Empowerment Index in Cassava: An Innovative Tool for Gender Mainstreaming

Analysis of women’s empowerment in cassava was done among farm women and farmers who are involved in cassava cultivation in Kanyakumari district of Tamil Nadu. Snowball sampling technique was employed for collecting data using semi-structured interview schedule from 50 women and 50 men farmers involved in cassava cultivation. The women empowerment index in cassava was used for estimating the domains of empowerment and gender parity index. Results revealed that cassava women farmers were more empowered than their household male counterparts in the domains of community leadership and time allocation. Whereas, male farmers were more empowered than their female counterparts in production decision making, access to productive resources and control over use of income. It was found that the overall women empowerment score was 0.83 with 28 per cent of women in disempowered category.

Role of Income Generating Activities in Empowering Rural Women of Bangladesh

In Bangladesh, women in rural regions are largely responsible for agricultural production, food security, and household upkeep. This study was carried out to examine the variables affecting the income of rural women, gauge women's empowerment, and pinpointthe main issues they confront. Both quantitative and qualitative data were collected through a pre-tested interview schedule from sixty women involved with income-generating activities. The multistage sampling procedure was used, and primary data were collected from Mymensingh Sadar, Muktagacha, and Bhaluka Upazila of Mymensingh district of Bangladesh from April to June 2021. Tabular analysis, Ordinary Least Square (OLS) method, Women Empowerment Index (WEI), and Problem Confrontation Index (PCI) were usedfor data analysis. The result shows that family size, farm size, work experience, and availability of credit have a significant positive influence on rural women's income. The estimated value of the WEI of the respondents is 1.23 which implies that women are empowered in the study area. Their capacity for decision-making has gradually enhanced as they are involved in income-generating activities.The major concerns faced by rural women include lack of capital, training facilities, credit availability and proper education, the higher price of the input, high-interest rates, etc. However, the survey still shows that rural women's involvement in income-generating activities has improved their quality of life more than at any prior point in the past.

Comparative study of effects of self-help groups on women empowerment:

Self-help groups (SHGs) were originally formed to provide savings and loans, but their function has evolved to include strengthening governance, and tackling social concerns such as gender and caste discrimination. Low cost credit to the poor through SHGs has been hailed as a significant poverty reduction tool in developing nations, although there is no evidence of its effectiveness. This paper, using primary survey data, compares the changes in different socio-economic factors of SHG women and non-SHG women. Three main dimensions have been assessed in this paper i.e. loan size, savings pattern, and women empowerment. We found that SHG women have higher scores in the average women empowerment index than women with no exposure to SHGs. SHG women on average use more loans for business purposes than non-SHG women.

Decision-Making Freedom among Households of Lower Income Group in Selangor, Malaysia

The present study aims to measure the current status of decision-making freedom on economic, social, and household related issues among the lower-income group categorized as the B40 in Selangor, Malaysia. The study utilizes a quantitative approach in analysing the primary data from a sample of 404, B40 people residing in the nine districts of Selangor. A stratified random sampling method is used to select the respondents and descriptive statistics together with Women Empowerment Index (WEI) are utilized in analysing the data. The WEI is employed to measure the status of freedom in terms of economic, social, and household decision-making. The study reveals that there is moderate level of freedom on decision-making in all three categories. The present study recommends policy considerations for successful and effective necessary guidelines for decision-making freedom on economic, social, and household related issues among the lower-income group categorized as the B40 in Selangor, Malaysia.

Empowering women can improve child dietary diversity in Ethiopia.

Women empowerment is an underlying factor of child feeding and nutrition. However, the lack of standardized measurements has made it difficult to design interventions that embed women empowerment and measure their impacts. This study aimed to assess temporal trends in women empowerment in Ethiopia and evaluate their contribution towards improving dietary diversity in infants and young children. We used women and child data from the Ethiopian Demographic and Health Survey 2005, 2011, and 2016, yielding a total sample of 6113 mother-child pairs. The survey-based women's empowerment index (SWPER) developed and validated for use in Africa was used to assess three dimensions of women empowerment: (i) social autonomy, (ii) decision making; and (iii) attitude to violence. We used multiple-linear and multivariable logistic regression to assess the associations between SWPER and the number of food groups consumed/and the minimum dietary diversity (MDD). To determine drivers of changes over time, a regression decomposition analysis was run. Women empowerment indices have improved over the 2005-2016 period, but a significant proportion of women had low standardized SWPER scores for autonomy/social independence (47%) and attitude to violence (49%) domains in 2016. SWPER autonomy and SWPER decision-making scores were strongly associated with the odds of meeting MDD. Changes in women empowerment accounted for 17% of the improvements in MDD between 2005 and 2016. SWPER was a stronger predictor of the change in MDD, than known predictors like wealth, child age, and urban residence. As a critical underlying driver of child nutrition, women empowerment should be boldly addressed and integrated in nutrition interventions.

Into the Civic life: The Nexus of Urbanization, Education and Women’s Empowerment in Pakistan

Women comprise nearly 50 percent of the population of Pakistan which is enriched with a variety of regional, cultural, and ethnic values. These values are traditionally responsible for limiting opportunities for women and keeping them less empowered. This study examines the link between education and urbanization that is empowering women in Pakistan. Time series data for the period of 1980 to 2019 has been used for empirical analysis. The stationarity of data has been checked by using the ADF unit root test. All the variables used in the study have a unit root at the level and become stationary at first difference. Johansen's co-integration technique is utilized to check the long-run relationship between the variables used in the study. Instead of using any single variable, we have constructed the Women Empowerment Index (WEI) by using multiple women-related indicators for in-depth analysis. Empirical findings indicate that women's empowerment is positively associated with education and urbanization in Pakistan. Other controlled variables include domestic credit with a positive association and inflation with a negative association. The study shows that empowering women is sensitive to urbanization and education. There must be women-specific educational and training institutions across the country with a special focus on rural areas for equal availability of opportunities for women of all cultures. Urbanization provides greater social, economic and political opportunities for women. Same opportunities should be provided for women in rural areas to make them more empowered. Moreover, control of inflation and the provision of credit on easy terms will also help to enhance women's contribution to economic activity in Pakistan.

22A Survey-Based Women's Empowerment Index for Low- and Middle-Income Countries: The SWPER Goes Global

Abstract Background In 2017, a survey-based women's empowerment index (SWPER) was proposed for African countries, including three domains: social independence, decision making and attitude to violence. We explored the applicability of the SWPER in national health surveys from countries in other world regions. Methods We used data from the latest Demographic and Health Survey for 62 low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) since 2000, and adapted the indicator so that it could be used for any LMIC. Adaptations included the exclusion of women's working status and recategorization of the household decision-making related items. We compared the loading patterns obtained from principal components analysis for each country separately with those obtained in a pooled dataset with all countries combined. Country rankings based on the score of each SWPER domain were correlated with their rankings in the Gender Development Index (GDI) and the Gender Inequality Index (GII). Results Most countries presented similar patterns regarding item loadings for the three SWPER empowerment domains. Correlations between the country-specific and global individual-level scores were 0.89 or higher for all countries. Correlations between the country rankings according to SWPER and GDI were, respectively, 0.74, 0.71 and 0.67 for social independence, decision-making, and attitude to violence domains. The correlations were equal to 0.82, 0.67, and 0.44, respectively, with GDI. Conclusions The SWPER global is a suitable common measure of women's empowerment for LMICs, addressing the need for a single consistent survey-based indicator of women's empowerment and allowing wider comparisons across countries and world regions.

The Effects of Husbands' Alcohol Consumption and Women's Empowerment on Intimate Partner Violence in India.

The influence of husband's alcohol consumption and that of women's empowerment has been largely studied separately in relation to the intimate partner violence (IPV) faced by women, which has hindered a nuanced understanding of gender-based violence in India. This study aimed to understand how husbands' alcohol consumption shapes the relationship between women's empowerment and violence among Indian couples. Data from the 2015-16 National Family Health Survey (NFHS) were used in this study. A composite women's empowerment index was constructed and its association with husbands' drunkenness and odds of facing emotional, physical, severe, and sexual violence was examined. This study found that compared to women whose husbands were never drunk, those whose husbands were sometimes or often drunk had significantly higher odds of experiencing physical, emotional, and sexual violence. For all the types of IPV, an increase in the empowerment index was associated with a significant reduction in the odds of experiencing violence. However, increasing frequency of husband's drunkenness in combination with increasing scores on the empowerment index was associated with a significant increase in the odds of IPV, except sexual violence. Our findings highlight the nuances of IPV, situating the experiences of women in the social, cultural, and economic realities of Indian society.