Urban children tend to be better nourished than rural children. However, with rapid urbanisation across the developing world, a worrying increase in urban child malnutrition is occurring. Further, distinct groups of urban children are worse off than their rural counterparts. Little is known, though, about whether the causes of malnutrition are different in urban and rural areas.

Researchers from the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) used data from 36 developing countries to fill this information gap and inform decisions on responding to child malnutrition.

The researchers found that the same social and economic factors affect children’s nutritional status in urban and rural areas, including their mothers’ education and status, access to safe water and sanitation and the relative wealth of their household. These factors in turn have a strong influence on mothers’ health and their caring practices such as prenatal care and child feeding.

The reason that urban children are generally better off nutritionally is because people in towns and cities are usually better off in all of these factors:

• Urban women have advantages over rural women in education, nutrition, access to pre-natal care and are more likely to give birth in a medical facility. All of these factors make their children less prone to malnutrition.
• There are more poor households in rural areas than in urban areas. Poverty affects ability to provide food, sanitation, healthcare, education and childcare when the parents are away.
• As urban children are more likely to receive health care, they have greater access to immunisations and diarrhoea treatment, which are especially relevant for avoiding malnutrition.
• Urban people have greater access to piped water and sanitation. These, especially sanitation, make them less prone to infections which affect children’s height and weight.
• Urban women generally have more power to make decisions in the household which is connected to better nutrition among their children.

The only factor for which urban children do worse is breastfeeding. Rural mothers breastfeed more and for longer than those in towns and cities. However, more urban babies are introduced to food at the appropriate time and they are fed higher quality foods, which helps to compensate for the breastfeeding difference.

Policymakers should realise that:

• Because the factors that determine child malnutrition do not differ between urban and rural areas, the same programmes and policy frameworks can be used in both settings.
• Programmes may, however, have to be applied differently – urban poor people are more geographically scattered since they tend to work away from home where they may be harder to access.
• Interventions should complement, rather than interfere with, the livelihood strategies of urban poor people.

Source(s):
‘Why is child malnutrition lower in urban then rural areas? An assessment from 36 countries’, International Food Policy Research Institute, FCND Discussion Paper No. 176, by Lisa C. Smith, Marie T. Ruel and Aida Ndiaye, March 2004 Full document.

Funded by: SIDA

id21 Research Highlight: 27 July 2005

Further Information:
Lisa C. Smith
Food Consumption and Nutrition Division
International Food Policy Research Institute
2033 K Street, N.W.
Washington, D.C. 20006
U.S.A.

Tel: + 1 202 862 5600
Fax: + 1 202 467 4439
Contact the contributor: L.C.Smith@cgiar.org

International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI)

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