The impact of the production composition on the nutrition status of agricultural households in Rwanda

Abstract

In a context of perfect markets, the impact of production decisions of peasants on their nutritional status is conveyed through an income effect and the structure of the output does not matter. Because of the imperfect and missing markets in LDCs, the levels of their agricultural outputs may directly affect the nutritional status of agricultural households. We estimate a production function for the nutritional status of agricultural households in Rwanda, that depends on sociodemographic characteristics and on past levels of agricultural outputs. The most beneficial outputs are tubers and an aggregate good composed of food products of high quality, while the traditional beers output and the nonfood products have a negative impact on the nutrition indicators. The sociodemographic characteristics of the household are influential, but they do not seriously modify the effects of the agricultural outputs. The results suggest that the nutrition policy in Rwanda could use incentives so as to modify the composition of the agricultural output of peasants.