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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Sustain. Food Syst.
Sec. Nutrition and Sustainable Diets
Volume 9 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fsufs.2025.1512272
Does production diversity support dietary diversity? Evidence from pastoral and agropastoral households in West Pokot County, Kenya
Provisionally accepted
Billy Okemer Ipara 1*
David Jakinda Otieno 1 Willis Oluoch-Kosura 1 Angela Adhiambo Andago 2
Magnus Jirström 3 Heather Mackay 3 Fredrik Fernqvist 4
Elisabeth Rajala 5- 1 Department of Agricultural Economics, University of Nairobi, Kenya, Nairobi, Kenya
- 2 Department of Food Science, Nutrition and Technology; Faculty of Agriculture, College of Agriculture and Veterinary Sciences, University of Nairobi, Nairobi, Kenya
- 3 Department of Human Geography, Lund University, Sölvegatan, Lund, Sweden, Sölvegatan, Lund, Sweden
- 4 Department of People and Society, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences (SLU), Lomma, Sweden
- 5 Department of Animal Biosciences, Faculty of Veterinary Medicine and Animal Science, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, Uppsala, Uppsala, Sweden
Consumption of part of own-produced food is regarded as a sustainable approach to attaining dietary diversity and a pathway to improved food and nutrition security. However, empirical evidence on the relationship between production diversity and dietary diversity is inconclusive, with some studies demonstrating a positive relationship while others reveal conflicting results.Furthermore, this relationship has not been examined in pastoral contexts. We used data from 502 pastoral and agro-pastoral households in West Pokot County, Kenya, to assess the relationship between production indicators and household dietary diversity. Our results show that households with more diverse production had more diverse diets. Additionally, we find that nutritional awareness, engagement in off-farm enterprises, income, market participation, and location based on agro-ecological characteristics influence dietary diversity. Our findings suggest that more diverse crop-livestock systems appropriate to the agro-ecological conditions of West Pokot may be a strategy towards addressing the nutritional inadequacies experienced in the region. Further investigation of the wider implications of such a transition is suggested.
Keywords: dietary diversity, pastoral and agro-pastoral households, production diversity, Poisson regression, West Pokot, Kenya
Received: 16 Oct 2024; Accepted: 06 Feb 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Ipara, Otieno, Oluoch-Kosura, Andago, Jirström, Mackay, Fernqvist and Rajala. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence:
Billy Okemer Ipara, Department of Agricultural Economics, University of Nairobi, Kenya, Nairobi, Kenya
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