报告题目：COVID-19 risk exposure and food insecurity in the MENA region: Evidence from a multi-wave household survey
报 告 人：Prof. Assem Reda Abdelkhalek Abuhatab
报告时间：2023年6月1日15:00
报告地点：经济管理学院C301会议室
报告人简介：
Assem ABU HATAB is a professor at the Department of Economics, the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences (SLU) in Uppsala, Sweden. He is also the coordinator of Global Development projects at the Faculty of Natural Resources & Agricultural Sciences in SLU. Besides his affiliation with SLU, Assem is an associate professor in economics and rural development at Arish University in Egypt. Assem is an applied agricultural economist with broad empirical interests and focus on food systems in developing countries and their interlinkages with food security and sustainable development. In recent years, his research has focused on international food and agricultural trade including issues related to food safety and quality standards; food supply and demand and commodity markets; food value chains; and the dynamics of urbanization and its links to urban food security in arid and semi-arid zones in developing countries. In addition, understanding the performance of China's rural and agricultural sectors has always been a strong dimension in his research agenda.
报告内容简介：
The outbreak and global spread of the COVID-19 pandemic from 2019 to 2022 had disruptive consequences for economic activity, employment and earnings, and food security in MENA countries. This paper makes use of a longitudinal panel data set from five waves of the Combined COVID-19 MENA Monitor Household survey that was carried out in Jordan, Morocco, Sudan, Tunisia and Egypt to examine the association between one's perception of the risk of contracting COVID-19 and their experiences with food insecurity. Then, it explores the factors that prevented households from mitigating the economic consequences of the elevated risk of contracting the virus, as well as the decline of informal support networks and coping mechanisms. Overall, the results present compelling evidence of an association between an individual's concern about contracting COVID-19 and all dimensions of household’s food insecurity. Especially, a greater concern about catching the virus was strongly associated with a household's reduced ability to purchase their typical amount of food due to food price increases and a tendency to decrease meal frequency or portion sizes. Interestingly, the association between an individual’s concern about contracting COVID-19 and household food insecurity was found to follow an inverted U-shaped curve as household food insecurity tended to increase as individuals’ worries about contracting the virus grew, and then markedly fell after they had been infected with the virus. The cross-country analysis showed remarkable differences between the five countries, with the strongest association between COVID-19 concerns and adherence to mitigation measures observed in Tunisia and Sudan, and the weakest association seen in Jordan and Morocco. Insights gained from this study should inform the development of effective policies to strengthen social protection systems and safety nets and ensure food security for the most vulnerable during public health crises and economic downturns.
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