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Do voluntary associations reduce hunger? An empirical exploration of the social capital- food security nexus among food impoverished households in western Nepal

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  • Veeshan Rayamajhee

    (1 University of New Mexico, MSC05 3060)

  • Alok K. Bohara

    (University of New Mexico)

Abstract

Using involvement in voluntary associations and the density of community groups as measures of social capital, the paper empirically examines its potential interlink with food security. To account for the potentially endogenous nature of individual social capital, we used a multi-equation recursive modeling framework allowing for contemporaneous correlation across equations. We demonstrate that strengthening social capital can be an effective way of combatting extreme food insecurity. However, our empirical findings also highlight a cautionary note, that lumping all forms of social capital into one unit to force a uniform narrative about its impacts can be misleading. Using cross sectional household data from food-impoverished western Nepal, we show that participation in finance-related associations has a direct impact on hunger mitigation, whereas associations that have informational or other roles do not have such an impact. Our findings suggest that community level social capital may have “environmental” effects that can lead to positive food security outcomes. On the other hand, while involvement in informational associations has no direct significant impact on the prevalence of hunger, we found that they help to improve the nutritional quality of diets, thereby circuitously leading to improvements in the food security status of women in Nepal.

Suggested Citation

  • Veeshan Rayamajhee & Alok K. Bohara, 2019. "Do voluntary associations reduce hunger? An empirical exploration of the social capital- food security nexus among food impoverished households in western Nepal," Food Security: The Science, Sociology and Economics of Food Production and Access to Food, Springer;The International Society for Plant Pathology, vol. 11(2), pages 405-415, April.
  • Handle: RePEc:spr:ssefpa:v:11:y:2019:i:2:d:10.1007_s12571-019-00907-0
    DOI: 10.1007/s12571-019-00907-0
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    Cited by:

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    2. Chandio, Abbas Ali & Jiang, Yuansheng & Ahmad, Fayyaz & Adhikari, Salina & Ain, Qurat Ul, 2021. "Assessing the impacts of climatic and technological factors on rice production: Empirical evidence from Nepal," Technology in Society, Elsevier, vol. 66(C).
    3. Saeed Nosratabadi & Nesrine Khazami & Marwa Ben Abdallah & Zoltan Lackner & Shahab S. Band & Amir Mosavi & Csaba Mako, 2020. "Social Capital Contributions to Food Security: A Comprehensive Literature Review," Papers 2012.03606, arXiv.org.
    4. Egamberdiev, Bekhzod & Bobojonov, Ihtiyor & Kuhn, Lena & Glauben, Thomas, 2023. "Household resilience capacity and food security: Evidence from Kyrgyzstan," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, vol. 15(4), pages 967-988.
    5. Muriuki, James & Hudson, Darren & Fuad, Syed & March, Raymond J. & Lacombe, Donald J., 2023. "Spillover effect of violent conflicts on food insecurity in sub-Saharan Africa," Food Policy, Elsevier, vol. 115(C).
    6. Abbas Ali Chandio & Waqar Akram & Uzma Bashir & Fayyaz Ahmad & Sultan Adeel & Yuansheng Jiang, 2023. "Sustainable maize production and climatic change in Nepal: robust role of climatic and non-climatic factors in the long-run and short-run," Environment, Development and Sustainability: A Multidisciplinary Approach to the Theory and Practice of Sustainable Development, Springer, vol. 25(2), pages 1614-1644, February.

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