ABSTRACT Vitamin A deficiency is a public health problem in Ghana. In 2002, behavior change and c... more ABSTRACT Vitamin A deficiency is a public health problem in Ghana. In 2002, behavior change and communication interventions (mother-to-mother support groups), food-based interventions (including an educational program about porridge enrichment), and a microcredit intervention were implemented in Ghana's Savelugu-Nanton District with the aim of improving children's diets, including their vitamin A consumption. Using data from a 2004 survey, we examine the interventions' influences on mothers' vitamin A knowledge and children's vitamin A consumption. We measure both intent to treat impacts of exogenously assigned combinations of the interventions being present in a community and treatment effects of mothers participating in different interventions on mothers' vitamin A knowledge and children's vitamin A consumption. Considering the results of the two approaches together allows us to draw several conclusions: Mothers' participation in the mother-to-mother support groups is associated with children consuming eggs and red palm oil (two vitamin A rich foods) more frequently, higher total frequency of consumption of vitamin A rich foods, and children consuming more vitamin A from foods emphasized in the interventions. Mothers' participation in the porridge enrichment component of the food-based interventions is associated with greater knowledge of vitamin A among mothers and more frequent egg consumption among children. Mothers' participation in the microcredit intervention is associated with children consuming egg more frequently and children consuming more vitamin A from foods emphasized in the interventions. Mother's participation in either the mother-to-mother support groups or the microcredit intervention is associated with the child consuming an additional 10% of her recommended daily allowance of vitamin A. Other determinants of children's consumption of vitamin A rich foods include the child's age, mother's education, ethnicity, household expenditures, household cultivated land area, and the mother's vitamin A knowledge. Mothers' vitamin A knowledge, in turn, is positively associated with household access to radio, household expenditures, and participation in the porridge enrichment program. Although the association between household expenditures and children's vitamin A consumption is statistically significant, the estimated impact is small, likely due to the overall low incomes of sample households. Recommendations for future programming include increasing participation in interventions and combining vitamin A education from the porridge-enrichment intervention with a more sustained intervention like the mother-to-mother support groups or the microcredit intervention. The survey was conducted for UNICEF/IFPRI/UDS Food and Nutrition Security Project. Krista L. Jacobs was a graduate student at the University of California, Davis during the completion of this study. The findings and conclusions of ths article are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the views of the CDC or IFPRI or the views of the World Bank, its Executive Directors, or the countries they represent.
Nutrition education and microcredit have become common interventions to reduce childhood malnutri... more Nutrition education and microcredit have become common interventions to reduce childhood malnutrition. Caregivers’ participation in the interventions is crucial to their success. This paper examines patterns of awareness of and participation in nutrition education and microcredit interventions in northern Ghana. We use epidemiological principles to create and estimate models for caregivers’ awareness of the interventions. We then estimate probit models for participation in each intervention controlling for sample selection on awareness of the intervention. We find lack of awareness of the interventions to be the main barrier to participation. Ethnicity, engagement in economic activity, being on traditional childbirth visit, and the degree of awareness of an intervention among one’s neighbors are significant determinants of primary caregivers’ awareness of the interventions. We also identify a positive association between a primary caregiver’s participation in a nutrition education i...
Women’s property rights especially access to land are increasingly recognized as critical to achi... more Women’s property rights especially access to land are increasingly recognized as critical to achieving poverty reduction and gender equality. Research shows that community-based legal aid programs are a viable approach to improving legal knowledge and women’s access to legal resources to address property issues. From 2009-2010 the International Center for Research on Women (ICRW) and the Uganda Land Alliance (ULA) implemented and evaluated a pilot program to strengthen women’s property rights. This report describes the pilot program’s implementation outcomes and lessons. It details the program design methodologies for monitoring and evaluation and the context in which the program was implemented. Findings include a discussion of challenges encountered by the rights workers and overall program achievements. And recommendations for community rights work as an approach to promoting women’s property rights also are included.
Degree granted in Agricultural and Resource Economics. Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of California,... more Degree granted in Agricultural and Resource Economics. Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of California, Davis, 2006.
Women’s property rights especially access to land are increasingly recognized as critical to achi... more Women’s property rights especially access to land are increasingly recognized as critical to achieving poverty reduction and gender equality. Research shows that community-based legal aid programs are a viable approach to improving legal knowledge and women’s access to legal resources to address property issues. From 2009-2010 the International Center for Research on Women (ICRW) and the Uganda Land Alliance (ULA) implemented and evaluated a pilot program to strengthen women’s property rights. This report describes the pilot program’s implementation outcomes and lessons. It details the program design methodologies for monitoring and evaluation and the context in which the program was implemented. Findings include a discussion of challenges encountered by the rights workers and overall program achievements. And recommendations for community rights work as an approach to promoting women’s property rights also are included.
Vitamin A deficiency is a public health problem in Ghana. In 2002, behavior change and communicat... more Vitamin A deficiency is a public health problem in Ghana. In 2002, behavior change and communication interventions (mother-to-mother support groups), food-based interventions (including an educational program about porridge enrichment), and a microcredit intervention were implemented in Ghana's Savelugu-Nanton District with the aim of improving children's diets, including their vitamin A consumption. Using data from a 2004 survey, we examine the interventions' influences on mothers' vitamin A knowledge and children's vitamin A consumption. We measure both intent to treat impacts of exogenously assigned combinations of the interventions being present in a community and treatment effects of mothers participating in different interventions on mothers' vitamin A knowledge and children's vitamin A consumption. Considering the results of the two approaches together allows us to draw several conclusions: Mothers' participation in the mother-to-mother support...
Vitamin A deficiency is a public health problem in Ghana. In 2002, behavior change and communicat... more Vitamin A deficiency is a public health problem in Ghana. In 2002, behavior change and communication interventions (mother-to-mother support groups), food-based interventions (including an educational program about porridge enrichment), and a microcredit intervention were implemented in Ghana's Savelugu-Nanton District with the aim of improving children's diets, including their vitamin A consumption. Using data from a 2004 survey, we examine the interventions' influences on mothers' vitamin A knowledge and children's vitamin A consumption. We measure both intent to treat impacts of exogenously assigned combinations of the interventions being present in a community and treatment effects of mothers participating in different interventions on mothers' vitamin A knowledge and children's vitamin A consumption. Considering the results of the two approaches together allows us to draw several conclusions: Mothers' participation in the mother-to-mother support...
ABSTRACT This study uses individual-level survey data from women and men in Uganda and South Afri... more ABSTRACT This study uses individual-level survey data from women and men in Uganda and South Africa to examine coupled women's joint ownership of land and housing. It compares women's control over and benefits from jointly held land and housing with those of coupled women not owning land or housing at all and coupled women owning them solely. The lack of a clear and consistent advantage of joint ownership potentially arises from frequent disagreement within couples about whether the land or house is jointly owned. The study serves as a reminder of the complexities of joint ownership in practice, particularly within families, that need to be considered in order for coupled women to benefit from joint asset ownership. Efforts promoting joint ownership, for example, joint titling and marital property laws supporting joint ownership, should not only consider these complexities but also establish and communicate clear and enforceable rules for joint ownership.
ABSTRACT Vitamin A deficiency is a public health problem in Ghana. In 2002, behavior change and c... more ABSTRACT Vitamin A deficiency is a public health problem in Ghana. In 2002, behavior change and communication interventions (mother-to-mother support groups), food-based interventions (including an educational program about porridge enrichment), and a microcredit intervention were implemented in Ghana's Savelugu-Nanton District with the aim of improving children's diets, including their vitamin A consumption. Using data from a 2004 survey, we examine the interventions' influences on mothers' vitamin A knowledge and children's vitamin A consumption. We measure both intent to treat impacts of exogenously assigned combinations of the interventions being present in a community and treatment effects of mothers participating in different interventions on mothers' vitamin A knowledge and children's vitamin A consumption. Considering the results of the two approaches together allows us to draw several conclusions: Mothers' participation in the mother-to-mother support groups is associated with children consuming eggs and red palm oil (two vitamin A rich foods) more frequently, higher total frequency of consumption of vitamin A rich foods, and children consuming more vitamin A from foods emphasized in the interventions. Mothers' participation in the porridge enrichment component of the food-based interventions is associated with greater knowledge of vitamin A among mothers and more frequent egg consumption among children. Mothers' participation in the microcredit intervention is associated with children consuming egg more frequently and children consuming more vitamin A from foods emphasized in the interventions. Mother's participation in either the mother-to-mother support groups or the microcredit intervention is associated with the child consuming an additional 10% of her recommended daily allowance of vitamin A. Other determinants of children's consumption of vitamin A rich foods include the child's age, mother's education, ethnicity, household expenditures, household cultivated land area, and the mother's vitamin A knowledge. Mothers' vitamin A knowledge, in turn, is positively associated with household access to radio, household expenditures, and participation in the porridge enrichment program. Although the association between household expenditures and children's vitamin A consumption is statistically significant, the estimated impact is small, likely due to the overall low incomes of sample households. Recommendations for future programming include increasing participation in interventions and combining vitamin A education from the porridge-enrichment intervention with a more sustained intervention like the mother-to-mother support groups or the microcredit intervention. The survey was conducted for UNICEF/IFPRI/UDS Food and Nutrition Security Project. Krista L. Jacobs was a graduate student at the University of California, Davis during the completion of this study. The findings and conclusions of ths article are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the views of the CDC or IFPRI or the views of the World Bank, its Executive Directors, or the countries they represent.
Nutrition education and microcredit have become common interventions to reduce childhood malnutri... more Nutrition education and microcredit have become common interventions to reduce childhood malnutrition. Caregivers’ participation in the interventions is crucial to their success. This paper examines patterns of awareness of and participation in nutrition education and microcredit interventions in northern Ghana. We use epidemiological principles to create and estimate models for caregivers’ awareness of the interventions. We then estimate probit models for participation in each intervention controlling for sample selection on awareness of the intervention. We find lack of awareness of the interventions to be the main barrier to participation. Ethnicity, engagement in economic activity, being on traditional childbirth visit, and the degree of awareness of an intervention among one’s neighbors are significant determinants of primary caregivers’ awareness of the interventions. We also identify a positive association between a primary caregiver’s participation in a nutrition education i...
Women’s property rights especially access to land are increasingly recognized as critical to achi... more Women’s property rights especially access to land are increasingly recognized as critical to achieving poverty reduction and gender equality. Research shows that community-based legal aid programs are a viable approach to improving legal knowledge and women’s access to legal resources to address property issues. From 2009-2010 the International Center for Research on Women (ICRW) and the Uganda Land Alliance (ULA) implemented and evaluated a pilot program to strengthen women’s property rights. This report describes the pilot program’s implementation outcomes and lessons. It details the program design methodologies for monitoring and evaluation and the context in which the program was implemented. Findings include a discussion of challenges encountered by the rights workers and overall program achievements. And recommendations for community rights work as an approach to promoting women’s property rights also are included.
Degree granted in Agricultural and Resource Economics. Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of California,... more Degree granted in Agricultural and Resource Economics. Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of California, Davis, 2006.
Women’s property rights especially access to land are increasingly recognized as critical to achi... more Women’s property rights especially access to land are increasingly recognized as critical to achieving poverty reduction and gender equality. Research shows that community-based legal aid programs are a viable approach to improving legal knowledge and women’s access to legal resources to address property issues. From 2009-2010 the International Center for Research on Women (ICRW) and the Uganda Land Alliance (ULA) implemented and evaluated a pilot program to strengthen women’s property rights. This report describes the pilot program’s implementation outcomes and lessons. It details the program design methodologies for monitoring and evaluation and the context in which the program was implemented. Findings include a discussion of challenges encountered by the rights workers and overall program achievements. And recommendations for community rights work as an approach to promoting women’s property rights also are included.
Vitamin A deficiency is a public health problem in Ghana. In 2002, behavior change and communicat... more Vitamin A deficiency is a public health problem in Ghana. In 2002, behavior change and communication interventions (mother-to-mother support groups), food-based interventions (including an educational program about porridge enrichment), and a microcredit intervention were implemented in Ghana's Savelugu-Nanton District with the aim of improving children's diets, including their vitamin A consumption. Using data from a 2004 survey, we examine the interventions' influences on mothers' vitamin A knowledge and children's vitamin A consumption. We measure both intent to treat impacts of exogenously assigned combinations of the interventions being present in a community and treatment effects of mothers participating in different interventions on mothers' vitamin A knowledge and children's vitamin A consumption. Considering the results of the two approaches together allows us to draw several conclusions: Mothers' participation in the mother-to-mother support...
Vitamin A deficiency is a public health problem in Ghana. In 2002, behavior change and communicat... more Vitamin A deficiency is a public health problem in Ghana. In 2002, behavior change and communication interventions (mother-to-mother support groups), food-based interventions (including an educational program about porridge enrichment), and a microcredit intervention were implemented in Ghana's Savelugu-Nanton District with the aim of improving children's diets, including their vitamin A consumption. Using data from a 2004 survey, we examine the interventions' influences on mothers' vitamin A knowledge and children's vitamin A consumption. We measure both intent to treat impacts of exogenously assigned combinations of the interventions being present in a community and treatment effects of mothers participating in different interventions on mothers' vitamin A knowledge and children's vitamin A consumption. Considering the results of the two approaches together allows us to draw several conclusions: Mothers' participation in the mother-to-mother support...
ABSTRACT This study uses individual-level survey data from women and men in Uganda and South Afri... more ABSTRACT This study uses individual-level survey data from women and men in Uganda and South Africa to examine coupled women's joint ownership of land and housing. It compares women's control over and benefits from jointly held land and housing with those of coupled women not owning land or housing at all and coupled women owning them solely. The lack of a clear and consistent advantage of joint ownership potentially arises from frequent disagreement within couples about whether the land or house is jointly owned. The study serves as a reminder of the complexities of joint ownership in practice, particularly within families, that need to be considered in order for coupled women to benefit from joint asset ownership. Efforts promoting joint ownership, for example, joint titling and marital property laws supporting joint ownership, should not only consider these complexities but also establish and communicate clear and enforceable rules for joint ownership.
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Papers by Krista Jacobs