Rising concerns regarding maternal and child nutritional status in South Africa, and an interest in how this impacts maternal labour participation, has culminated in a PhD for DSI-NRF Centre of Excellence (CoE-FS)-funded graduate, Dr Fru Awah Wanka.
“Nutrition is a complex field of study,” says Dr Wanka. “As a result, I had to put in extra effort to be able to put forth a good argument.” Photo Supplied.
On 01 April 2022, Dr Wanka graduated from the Institute for Social Development at the University of the Western Cape (UWC) with a PhD in Development Studies. Her thesis, An analysis of maternal and child nutritional status in South Africa and its impact on maternal labour supply, was supervised by CoE-FS and IDS director Professor Julian May, and co-supervised by Dr Coretta Jonah.
“My thesis investigated the state of maternal and child malnutrition in South Africa and the effect these have on maternal labour supply over the period 2008 to 2017.
If we do not feed well, we end up being sick (malnourished), which is likely to affect our productivity later in life and those taking care of us,” said Wanka.
Based on her findings, the most persistent form of malnutrition affecting mothers is obesity, while for children, stunting is the most persistent form of malnutrition.
“Malnutrition has many forms: overweight, obesity and stunting, to name a few. So ‘malnourished’ means suffering from malnutrition,” explained Wanka.
To work or not
Wanka probed further, wanting to find out whether these persistent forms of malnutrition affect a mother’s decision to work or not.
“The results showed that mothers with stunted children are less likely to work or look for work,” said Wanka.
This, she explained, is because when a child is stunted, they often require “special attention in terms of feeding practice” and “more care in general”. Therefore, the mother who is the primary caregiver, is less likely to work or seek employment because more time is required for childcare.
“On the other hand, a mother’s decision to either work or not work, was not affected by her obese status.
“So it is important to solve the problem of stunting or prevent it so it does not affect the mother’s productivity and that of the child later in life,” said Wanka.
Important investigation
The rising concerns about obesity and childhood stunting, as well as female labour force participation globally and in Africa, was what motivated Wanka to undertake her research topic.
“Given that obesity greatly affects women more than men, and women are mostly the primary caregivers of children under five years of age (which is when children face the highest probability of being stunted), it was important to investigate if these variables affect a mother’s labour force participation,” she said.
It is also, to Wanka and Professor May’s knowledge, the first study of its kind in South Africa.
With her second UWC degree in the bag (her first being a Master’s in Economics), Wanka has already presented some of her findings at local and international conferences. She’ll be submitting them for publication and while she awaits feedback from accredited journals, Wanka will be on the hunt for work opportunities where she can put her expertise in food and nutrition security, economic development and health economics to good use.
