The Factors Affecting Food Access of Rural Households in Shavoor District

Access to food is the concept of sustainable physical and economic access to resources to provide food items needed by society. Although in line with population growth the production of agricultural products has increased, the access of the people to the food has decreased and it has caused hidden hunger and food insecurity on a large scale. According to the World Health Organization, approximately 60% of child deaths in developing countries are the result of chronic hunger and malnutrition. In Iran, the level of food insecurity is reported about 23%, and the situation of access to food in both physical and economic dimensions is far worse in rural than urban areas. For example, the level of food insecurity in the rural areas of Qarasu in West Azerbaijan is reported 59.4%. Lack of access to sufficient food and the occurrence of food insecurity are affected by various factors, including economic, social, cultural, political and environmental. As a result, due to the importance of access to food, this study tried to investigate the factors affecting the access of rural households to food in Shavoor district.

Current research is a non-experimental survey research with a quantitative approach. The statistical population was all the rural households of Shavoor district (N= 2624), of which 300 households (n= 300) were selected as a sample using the stratified sampling method with proportional assignment. The data used in this research was primary data that was collected by a questionnaire. The validity of the data collection tool was done based on the point of view of specialists, and Cronbach's alpha coefficient was used to determine its reliability. The value of this coefficient for different parts of the questionnaire was between 0.765 and 0.873, which indicates the appropriate reliability of the research tool. This study used SPSS, Excel, and SmartPLS for data analysis. In order to inferentially analyze the data, confirmatory factor analysis based on partial least square (PLS) method was used.

The findings showed that the average age of the respondents was over 47 years old, 85.7% were married, 28.7% were also illiterate. The average number of people per household in this study was 5.86 people. The average number of active people among the studied households was about two. Most households (41.3%) had an income of less than two million tomans per month and 58.3% of the households could not save any money. Although the main occupation of most (31%) heads of the studied households was agriculture, most of the households did not possess agricultural land. Also, the average area of irrigated and orchard lands and the number of light and heavy livestock of each studied household were 2.70 hectares, 0.37 hectares, 2.80 heads and 1.80 heads, respectively. According to the results of the confirmatory factor analysis based on Partial Least Squares (PLS) method, among the three main dimensions (physical, economic and continuity of access), the physical access to food is more unfavorable (0.458) than the economic access (0.900) and continuity of access (0.909). Based on the research findings, economic (0.528), social (0.362), and individual and family (0.340) factors are the most important factors affecting rural households' access to food respectively. Among the economic factors, the income variable has a greater impact on food access. Food consumption pattern and the education level of the head of the household, respectively among the social and the individual-family factors are very important and have a significant effect on improving the access of households to food. Various studies have emphasized the effect of the low level of education of heads of households in a society on poverty and food insecurity. Also, physical factors play a decisive role in households' access to food, and these factors indirectly affect the level of rural households' access to food.

In this research, an attempt was made to analyze the factors affecting the improvement of access to food for rural households in Shavor village located in Susa county. The findings of this research showed that despite the fact that the main source of income for most of the rural households in this village is from the agricultural sector, the situation of rural households' access to food is not favorable, especially in terms of physical access. And various factors, including economic, individual-family factors, social and physical, have directly and indirectly affected this access. In order to improve the access level of rural households to food, it is suggested to provide the necessary background and platform for diversifying rural jobs and improving their income sources. Creation and support of various organizations (such as consumer cooperatives) with the aim of providing facilities and supply of food items at a better price and with more variety to the villagers, targeting the granting of subsidies to agricultural inputs, adopting appropriate support policies for the price of agricultural products, strengthening the market and the transportation network for agricultural products are among the best solutions to improve the level of access of villagers to food.