Intra- household food allocation among adolescents in coffee farming households in Jimma Zone, South west Ethiopia

There are wide ranges of factors that determine individual food insecurity within households. In cash crop area products are for market rather than for agricultural households that can cause food accessibility to a severe challenge. There is, however, a dearth of information about the food security status of adolescent living inside coffee farming households. The aim of this study is to investigate the prevalence of adolescent food insecurity and determine its factors among coffee producing districts in Jimma Zone, South west Ethiopia. Community based cross-sectional study was employed in coffee producing district in Jimma zone, from April-May 2016. A total of 550 households having adolescents were included.  Data were entered into EpiData and the analyses were made by SPSS version 20. Bi-variate and multivariable logistic regression was done  and  p-value  <  0.05  considered  as  a  cut-off  point  to  determine  statistical significance. Sixty percent of adolescents (60%) were found to be food insecure. Female adolescents [AOR=2.18, 95%CI (1.4-3.48)], household food insecurity [AOR=9.4, 95%CI (5.49-16.19)], male of household heads [AOR=2.77, 95%CI (1.44-5.33)], high dependency ratio [AOR=2.53,  95%CI  (1.447-4.446)],  not  formally  educated  household  head  [AOR=4.925, 95%CI (2.636-9.201)] and have no own land for farm [AOR=2.484, 95%CI (1.24-4.96)] were positively independent predictors of adolescent food insecurity. This study highlighted the problem of food insecurity in coffee producing farmers. Sex of adolescent, dependency ratio, sex of household head, household heads’ educational status, food security status of household and farm land owner ship are predictors of adolescent food insecurity. This pushes us to advance direct nutrition interventions focusing on adolescents to endorse catch-up growth and break the intergenerational cycle of malnutrition.   Key words: Adolescent, food insecurity, coffee farmer.