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Child Growth in the Time of Drought
Author(s) -
Hoddinott John,
Kinsey Bill
Publication year - 2001
Publication title -
oxford bulletin of economics and statistics
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.131
H-Index - 73
eISSN - 1468-0084
pISSN - 0305-9049
DOI - 10.1111/1468-0084.t01-1-00227
Subject(s) - economics , demographic economics , slowdown , panel data , economic growth , econometrics
This paper examines the impact of rainfall shocks on a measure of child health, growth in height, drawing on a unique household panel data set from rural Zimbabwe. We find that children aged 12 to 24 months lose 1.5‐2 cm of growth in the aftermath of a drought. Catch‐up growth in these children is limited so that this growth faltering has a permanent effect. By contrast, there is no evidence that older children experience a slowdown in growth. There is some evidence that the loss in growth is unequally distributed with children residing in poorer households and offspring of women who are daughters of the household head appearing to be especially vulnerable.