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Microfinance Participation and Food Security
27 Jan 2010, Brett, J.

Paper presented at "Global Health Lecture Series", January 2010, Sydney

The presentation examines how people fare economically and socially as a consequence of participating in microfinance and the reasons for the same. It specifically examines the effect of microfinance on food security.

The research used quantitative and qualitative methods. It followed a randomly selected group of women for 14 months, with three survey instruments, namely, financial diaries, food security and dietary diversity as well as health status and health care access. Survey questions proceeded from anxiety to physical consequences of insufficient food. Findings indicate that:

Situation did not change much according to a range of factors usually associated with food insecurity, such as loan size, household income, household size and borrowers’ education levels;
Food insecurity was worse in rural areas;
Food insecurity was caused by structural context of microfinance participation, traditional approach to diet and large number of competing interests for limited funds.

The poor spend up to 65 percent of daily income on food. Given multiple fixed costs, the food budget is one of the few areas for flexibility. The question to be asked, therefore, is whether food security is a reasonable measure of microfinance success.

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Publisher(s):
University of Sydney