Determinants of Food Security among Rural Women in Kaduna State, Nigeria

Adequate nutrition is a crucial component of a healthy society. One of the major problems of human health is malnutrition and it is in every society. Rural households engage in food production, yet, they are mostly food insecure.This study accessed the determinants of food security among rural women in Kaduna state. Multi-stage sampling procedure was used to draw the sample. Four rural Local Government Areas (LGAs) were randomly selected, while three villages were randomly sampled from each LGA resulting in 12 villages. Ten percent of the rural women in each of the sampled villages were randomly selected to give a total of 240 respondents. Interview schedule was used for data collection. Data were analyzed using descriptive and inferential statistics such as Chi–square, Pearson Product Moment Correlation (PPMC) and Regression. Mean age was 29.7±8.08 years. Most (60.4%) of the respondents were Christians. Thirty-four percent of the respondents hadsecondary education while some (40.0%) of the respondents were involved in trading. Dry season was considered as season of abundance by majority (70.8%) of the respondents. PPMC indicates that age (r=0.119; p=0.009) and household size, (r = 0.221; P = 0.001) were significantly related with household food security, while position as wife (β= 0.194), household size (β= -0.173) and monthly income (β= -0.095) were major determinants of household food security. Rural women have reasonable access to food. The study recommends that rural women should practice home gardening and domesticate animals to enhance food secured rural family.