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Beating the Zero-Sum Game: Women and Nutrition in the Third World. Part 2

1990; SAGE Publishing; Volume: 12; Issue: 1 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1177/156482659001200120

1564-8265

Judith McGuire, Barry M. Popkin,

Poverty, Education, and Child Welfare

Conflicting time energy and economic demands are made on women. 4 particular classes of interventions might reduce the obstacles that women face in improving their nutritional situation: 1) increasing womens income and control of income; 2) improving their health and nutrition; 3) reducing their child-care burden; and increasing their productivity in household production. Because poor women do not have resources these conflicts make a zero-sum game exist. Policies and programs are shown to make a positive-sum game. In nutrition womens income buys food women grow food women prepare food and breastfeed and women use physical energy for work. To make a positive-sum game women have to be able to increase their access to food reduce the nutritional costs of role conflicts and enhance their control over nutritional resources. Women need access to more income to overcome these conflicts. The most successful programs minimized conflicts in womens economic responsibilities and time commitments between market and family. Child care and occupational training were provided; health and child care were provided with agricultural development attempts; cost recovery and credit were also provided. These successful programs responded at the same time to time and money. Promoting good child care through technical assistance and public subsidies; facilitating womens access to credit; ensuring womens access to technology and other productive resources; and creating demand for family planning nutrition and womens health are central to the interventions needed but further is needed.