ABSTRACT
PIP: The results of an investigation into the relationships among child nutrition, child mortality, and fertility in Nicaragua are presented. Data are from a 1977-1978 survey of 1,085 households. The analysis is performed using a consistent model developed from the household production model of Gary S. Becker. The focus of the study is on the identification of key variables that can hasten simultaneously the decline of fertility and mortality and the improvement of child nutrition in developing countries. In the urban sector, the woman's potential wage rate had the largest impact on improving child nutrition and lowering fertility; educational status of both partners was also significant. In rural areas, other family income and female education were the significant variables positively affecting child nutrition and reducing fertility.^ieng
Subject(s)
Child Nutritional Physiological Phenomena , Economics , Educational Status , Fertility , Income , Infant Mortality , Infant Nutritional Physiological Phenomena , Mortality , Rural Population , Urban Population , Americas , Central America , Demography , Developed Countries , Developing Countries , Health , Latin America , Models, Theoretical , Nicaragua , North America , Nutritional Physiological Phenomena , Population , Population Characteristics , Population Dynamics , Social Class , Socioeconomic FactorsABSTRACT
"This study had two main goals. The first was to test the hypothesis that women who work in the informal sector of the labor force have better-nourished children, ceteris paribus, than women who work in the formal sector. A simple home production model for child nutrition incorporating this hypothesis was specified and the behavior of a utility-maximizing household investigated. The empirical estimates of the nutritional status production function provided no convincing support for the hypothesis." The second goal was "to investigate the joint determinants of child nutrition and of women's fertility and work choices....[It is suggested] that increases in women's education and formal sector wages will induce declines in fertility and improvements in child nutrition. Increases in informal sector wages will improve nutrition but have little impact on fertility, and income effects are minimal on all three variables." Data are from a household survey conducted in Nicaragua in 1977 and 1978.