Determinants of food accessibility of rural households in the Limpopo Province, South Africa

Type Thesis or Dissertation - Master's thesis
Title Determinants of food accessibility of rural households in the Limpopo Province, South Africa
Author(s)
Publication (Day/Month/Year) 2012
URL http://lib.ugent.be/catalog/rug01:001894520
Abstract
This study has assessed household food security (access) and its determinants across selected rural households from all the five districts in the Limpopo province in South Africa, using a large cross-sectional household survey. Data were collected by using structured questionnaires. Two municipalities were randomly selected from each district. A total of 600 households were involved in the study with 60 households selected from each municipality. Approximately 15% of the households were categorized as food secure, 6% as mildly food-insecure, 26% as moderately food-insecure and 53% as severely food-insecure. Majority of the households purchase their food from the market rather than their own production and in many situations, market purchases of the major food staples such as mielies constituted more than 90% of the food consumed by the households. A factor analysis of the household responses to their food access experiences of the past 30days prior to the study revealed two main factors: (1) mild-to-moderate food insecurity; and (2) severe food insecurity. The factors, jointly, explained approximately 82% of the total variance in the responses. The factors were used in further multiple linear regressions analyses. The findings clearly suggest that education, gender, age of household head and household size affect both mild-to-moderate food insecurity as well as the experience of severe household food insecurity in the study area. Additionally, household production of vegetables, low dependency ratio, steady income source such as those from formal employment as well as household receipts of social grants and remittances were associated with lower levels of mild-to-moderate food insecurity.

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