Malnutrition and Gender Bias: A case Study From Bangladesh

Bangladesh is one of the few countries in the world where female children experience higher mortality than their male counterpart, especially after the neonatal period. Various factors, including discrimination against female children in intra-family food distribution and healthcare, are thought to be possible mechanisms that result in inferior health and less chance of survival for females than males. This analysis provides an empirical study on child malnutrition using data collected from rural households in Bangladesh. It also investigates the impact of gender bias on child nutritional status. This study utilizes different measures of nutritional status to identify the existence of gender bias. Further, in the presence of gender bias, this study tries to identify the major factors giving rise to this discrimination. A sample group of the children between 0-59 months old is employed for the analysis. The study emphasizes three major aspects of child nutrition. The study explores the consequences of different socioeconomic determinants on both long-term (height-for-age) and short-term (weight-for-height) measures of child nutritional status and whether these consequences vary across different age groups. This thesis further extends itself to investigate the evidence of supposed discrimination against girls with respect to both long-term and short-term measures of child nutritional status. The study also concentrates on the influences of these socioeconomic factors on the existing gender discrimination. The major finding in this study is that there is a discrimination against girls for long-run nutritional status and that some socioeconomic factors and social beliefs and values are responsible for this discrimination.

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