Child Malnutrition in North-Eastern Region of India: Importance of Economic and Social Factors

Abstract

Lack of proper nutrition makes a long run impact on the life of the children and thus on the society. So, child nutrition should be the top priority of the nation. India has a significant percentage of malnourished children of the world. North Eastern Part of India is a neglected region in several respects including child nutrition. As there is no significant work done yet on the child nutrition of this region as a whole, this paper is all about the child malnutrition of the North Eastern region. In this paper child malnutrition is represented by percentage of stunted children as it captures long run impact of malnutrition. Most of the states of this region are showing increase in level of stunting among the children in 2019-20 as compared to 2015-16. Given this scenario, the basic objective of this paper is to identify the importance of socio-economic factors which causes stunting in North Eastern region. Fact sheets of NFHS 5 and Unit level data of NFHS 4 of children within 0 to 6 years is analyzed here as till now, unit level data of NFHS 5 is not available publicly. Probit regression is done here with a binary dependent variable of child stunting. It is seen that wealth status is not the important factor for determining child malnutrition. On the contrary, education level, employment status and health consciousness of mothers are influencing child nutrition level. Health condition of the mothers at the time of giving birth is also important for the nourishment of a child. To improve the nutrition of the children of North Eastern region, government should implement some specific policies related with overall development of the women.