Food Insecurity Status of Afghan Refugees is Linked to Socioeconomic and Resettlement Status, Gender Disparities and Children's Health Outcomes in Iran

Mohammad Reza Pakravan-Charvadeh (), Hassan Vatanparast (), Mahasti Khakpour () and Cornelia Flora ()
Additional contact information
Mohammad Reza Pakravan-Charvadeh: Lorestan University
Hassan Vatanparast: University of Saskatchewan
Mahasti Khakpour: University of Saskatchewan
Cornelia Flora: Iowa State University, Kansas State University

Child Indicators Research, 2021, vol. 14, issue 5, No 12, 1979-2000

Abstract: Abstract This study aims to evaluate whether having an overweight/obese child, gender disparities and socio-economic factors can be a predictor of food insecurity among Afghan refugee households in Tehran province in Iran. The paper was carried out by cross-sectional data analysis. Household Food Insecurity Assess Scale (HFIAS) questionnaire was circulated among 317 Afghan refugees which have been selected by random sampling. Descriptive analysis and logistic regression model were used to determine the associated factors. Of the total sample, 88.7% of refugee families were food insecure in Tehran province, among them 36% and 40% faced moderate and severe food insecurity respectively. The refugees’ income, housing expenditure, the number of educated household members, personal savings and mother’s age were significantly and inversely associated with food insecurity. The length of staying and living in the host country as an integration proxy indicator and the frequency of travel to Afghanistan was directly associated with food insecurity. The number of female and male children had a different association with households' food insecurity. Also, the BMI score in the overweight/obese level was inversely associated with Afghan refugees' food insecurity. The results rejected the unilateral association between food insecurity and overweight/obesity among refugees. The result indicated the necessity of considering the state-of-the-art techniques to examine the bilateral association between health outcome and food security status. Also, determining associated factors with refugees' food insecurity is necessary because these mediating determinants are key for understanding how to prescribe policies that create win-wins.

Keywords: Public health; Food insecurity; Afghan refugees; Socio-economic factors; BMI; Tehran; Iran (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s12187-021-09827-y Abstract (text/html)
Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:spr:chinre:v:14:y:2021:i:5:d:10.1007_s12187-021-09827-y

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.springer. ... f-life/journal/12187

DOI: 10.1007/s12187-021-09827-y

Access Statistics for this article

Child Indicators Research is currently edited by Asher Ben-Arieh

More articles in Child Indicators Research from Springer, The International Society of Child Indicators (ISCI)
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().