Improving children's nutritional status in Cambodia: Multidimensional poverty and early integrated interventions.

One in three Cambodian children under 5 years of age are stunted. This study adopted a multidimensional approach to understand the influence of a series of contextual factors on the nutritional status of Cambodian children. In this study, we use a multidimensional poverty framework to identify a combination of interventions likely to achieve reductions in child stunting, in Cambodia. We used the UNICEF Multiple Overlapping Deprivation Analysis tool and data from the Cambodia Demographic and Health Survey 2014 to assess children's multidimensional poverty across nutrition, health, early childhood development, water, sanitation, and housing dimensions. We found that 80% of children under age five were deprived in at least two poverty dimensions. Multivariate logistic regression analysis revealed that reducing the likelihood of being deprived in three or more poverty dimensions was associated with a significant reduction of the probability of being stunted, after controlling for potential confounders. The combined probability of nondeprivation in nutrition, sanitation, and health dimensions had the largest effect on reducing the probability of stunting. The results of this study highlight the multiple, intersecting needs of children and their associated explanatory factors. Targeted and integrated cross-sectoral policies that reinforce comprehensive early childhood interventions are needed for improving nutritional status as part of a wider set of child poverty reduction measures in Cambodia.

Child Poverty in Vietnam: Providing Insights Using a Country-Specific and Multidimensional Model.

Despite a wide under-prioritization, the issue of child poverty has received increasing attention worldwide over the last decade. The acknowledgement in Vietnam that child-specific poverty measurement is crucial for poverty efforts directed towards children, and the current lack thereof, instigated the development of a Vietnam child poverty approach. This paper proposes a country-specific, multidimensional and outcome-based approach for the measurement of the incidence, depth and severity of child poverty. It does so at the level of the individual child using household survey data. The development of such an approach at the level of the individual child presents an appropriate alternative for or supplement to the widely used monetary poverty approach, allowing for the use of compatible analytical methods. Findings suggest that 37% of all children in Vietnam live in poverty, with the most pressing areas of deprivation being water, sanitation and leisure. We do not find evidence for a gender bias but do observe a large urban-rural divide, regional disparities and large ethnic inequalities. We argue that this tailor-made approach is a valuable new tool for policy makers and analysts in Vietnam as it enables identification and analysis of poor children, their characteristics and most pressing areas of deprivation within the country's specific social and cultural context.

The Importance of Choice and Definition for the Measurement of Child Poverty-the case of Vietnam.

Increased attention to childrens' special position within poverty measurement resulted in the development of various child poverty approaches in the last decade. Analysis shows that their development processes involve a similar set of steps and decisions, predominantly taken in the same sequence. However, it also becomes apparent that many of these decisions are made implicitly rather than explicitly, resulting in unclear and non-transparent underlying constructs. Consequently, child poverty approaches often lack a solid and robust foundation and are misinterpreted and misunderstood when used for analytical and policy purposes. This paper distills a generic construction process from the analysis of existing child poverty approaches, presenting a tool for clear and transparent development of such approaches. It is then applied to the case of Vietnam, using household survey data, to illustrate its practical use and develop a Vietnam-specific child poverty approach. Findings suggest that 37% of all children are poor, whilst observing a large rural-urban divide but no significant differences between boys and girls.