SELF-REPORTED FOOD INSECURITY AS SIGNIFICANT PREDICTOR OF ILL HEALTH AMONG GHANAIAN HOUSEHOLDS

Food insecurity and ill-health have become topical issues that both researchers and development agents are concerned about. Food consumption directly links agriculture to health outcomes. Achieving zero hunger as enshrined in SDG 2 requires interventions that target those families and individuals experiencing food insecurity. In Ghana, food insecurity differs across regions and the socioeconomic status of households and individuals. Moreover, very little is known about the distribution of food insecurity and its effect on health outcomes. This study reveals the extent of food insecurity and the nexus that exists between food insecurity and ill-health as well as ill-days in the Ghanaian context. We used secondary data from the Ghana Living Standard Survey (GLSS) round seven and a sample size of 14,009 households which was further restricted to 13,818. The empirical models were analyzed in STATA 14. Eight sets of questions were used to measure self-reported food insecurity and an exploratory factor analysis was used to further transform the measurement into an index. The determining factors of the response variables and reverse causality between the endogenous variables were assessed first with the 2SLS estimator for separate equations given suitable instruments. We however proceeded with the 3SLS estimator for more efficient estimations. Region fixed effects and heterogeneity analysis (class of expenditure) were introduced. The incidence of food insecurity is very high in the order of Upper East, Northern, Upper West, Central, and Western Regions. However, the regions with a high prevalence of food insecurity also reported very high ill-health. Contrary to the expectation of the negative impact of extension service on food insecurity as revealed by literature, access to extension service is rather positively significant implying the need to intensify extension services. Food insecurity within Greater Accra was found to be 60% less as compared to the western region which makes sense that wealthier households are less likely to experience food insecurity however, food security programs should target food insecurity pruned areas. The issue of irrigation, impassable roads and lack of accessible financial institutions should be addressed. Keywords: Food insecurity, ill-health, ill-days, expenditure quartiles, region fix effect, Three Stage Least Square.