Determinants Of Urban Households’ Food Security: The Case Of Burayu Town, Oromia Special Zone, Ethiopia

Abstract

Food security problems have emerged as a major global challenge, especially for poor and urban households in low-income countries such as Ethiopia. However, there is little empirical evidence on urban food security status and how people living in urban areas are coping with sustained food shortage. This study aims to address this gap by analysis of food security status, associated factors and coping strategies in Burayu town at household level. The study is based on primary data collected from 177 sample selected at random using questionnaire. Additional information was also obtained from focus group discussion, key informant interview and personal observation. The data has been analyzed by descriptive statistics, inferential statistics (x2 and t-test) and economic model (binary model) using Stata software. Qualitative data were used to substantiate the responses of questionnaire. Findings of this study showed that 53.7 % and 46.3 of households were food insecure and secure, respectively. Findings of binary logistic regression analysis also showed that educational status. The model result shows out of 10 explanatory variables, about 5 variables had statistically significant relationship with household food security. Dependency ratio was negatively related with food security while the other variables (age, use of credit, educational status of household head, and income of household head) were positively related with household food security. The most common coping mechanisms households took include petty trading, reduce size of meal, work as daily laborer and reduce number of meals. Therefore, national policies and programs need to focus on giving attention for young age headed households the how to creating income generating activities, promoting family planning through integrated health and education services and attention should be given to credit advancing institutions such as microfinance and should make the loan. Finally, the study explored some survival strategies used by households to mitigate the impacts of food securit