Livestock Production, Animal Source Food Intake, and Young Child Growth: The Role of Gender for Ensuring Nutrition Impacts

Along with lack of nutrition knowledge, gender dimensions may affect the pathways leading from livestock ownership to child animal source food intake and ultimately to young child growth. Using data from a large-scale impact evaluation conducted in Kenya, this study tested the hypothesis that co-owned/female-owned livestock would be associated with improved child growth, mediated by increases in animal source food consumption. Multivariate linear regression models showed a positive association between co-owned/female-owned livestock with child weight-for-age z score (WAZ) after adjusting for caregiver education level, income, child age and gender.