Factors influencing household food consumption in the Tombouctou region in February 2018

Abstract

Tombouctou, one of the regions of Mali, is the most affected by food insecurity and malnutrition. For this present work, we initiated in February 2018 a study on the factors influencing the consumption and dietary diversity of households in the Timbuktu region. We performed a secondary analysis using data from the Malian National Food Security and Nutrition Survey (ENSAN) of February 2018 from the Timbuktu region. The basic methodology used was two-stage cluster sampling. Data analysis was performed on (SPSS) version 21. Pearson chi-square and logistic regression tests were performed with a 95% confidence level. Our study involved 11,354 households at 91% rural area and 99.2% residents. Most of the heads of the households (CM) were men (85.2%) with over two-fourths (40.2%) unschooled and married (86.1%). The food consumption score (SCA) of households was acceptable in 78.1% and that of dietary diversity (SDA) in 75.1%. Only the household status and quintile status of average wealth were not statistically associated. Dietary consumption, dietary diversity was not statistically associated to the wealth quintile. Our study showed that food consumption was statistically associated with all the sociodemographic characteristics except the household status and middle class of wealth quintile, while dietary diversity was statistically associated with all the sociodemographic characteristics except the status of the household and the wealth quintile.