Gender gap in the impact of social capital on household food security in Zimbabwe: does spatial proximity matter?

Despite the numerous strides that have been made towards ensuring food security since the launch of the United Nations Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), the gap between the rich and poor across and within countries is still worryingly too large. Around 57.7% of the Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) population is food insecure compared to 26.4% of the world population. It is therefore necessary to make concerted efforts to improve food security in Sub-Saharan Africa and the rest of the developing world particularly among the poorest and most vulnerable groups. This paper employs propensity score matching analysis to explore gender heterogeneity in the impact of bonding and bridging social capital on household food security on the basis of a nationally representative sample of Zimbabwean households. It offers five major findings. First, female headed households are more likely to have bonding social capital than their male counterparts. Second, there are no gender differences in the household’s ability to possess bridging social capital. Third, household spatial proximity to households with social capital improves the probability of the household possessing social capital. Fourth, both bonding and bridging social capital improves household food security. Finally, female headed households are more able to increase food security than those headed by males when they have both bonding and bridging social capital. The study argues that coping strategies should target putting the family at the core of inclusive development agendas such as food and nutrition assistance programmes in order to maximise the likelihood of easing food insecurity within communities.

Work, motherhood and women’s affective well-being

This paper analyzes how motherhood and labor market status interact in their relationship to women’s affective well-being using Day Reconstruction Method data from the United Kingdom Time Use Survey 2014–2015. The dataset contains information on how much time respondents spent on their various daily activities as well as how much they enjoyed each episode. This information is aggregated into a measure of an individual’s affective well-being on a given day by calculating the mean of the reported enjoyments weighted by the duration of the respective episode. Results indicate a positive and significant correlation between motherhood and affective well-being. However, this relationship decreases in magnitude and even becomes insignificant in some specifications when controlling for labor market status. This could indicate that an increase in the likelihood of being in a labor market status associated with higher affective well-being mediates the positive relationship between motherhood and affective well-being. Women working part-time, self-employed women, homemakers and women on maternity leave are shown to have higher affective well-being than full-time employees. Furthermore, the time spent on and enjoyment experienced in employment related activities appears to be a key driver of many results in this study. Contrasting results in specifications using a measure of life satisfaction highlight the importance of considering affective as well as cognitive well-being.