Food Security Status of PSNP Beneficiary Households in Rural Ethiopia

Food insecurity, malnutrition and vulnerability remain high in Ethiopia. PSNP as one component of the national food security program continue to function at scale and played vital role in terms of developing human and physical resources through huge capacity investments (MOA. 2008). Using cross sectional data from May to June 2015 on 160 households of two peasant associations in Libokemekem woreda the study tried to assess PSNP beneficiary households' food security status and prevalence of chronic malnutrition among children 6-59 months of age as well as identify the determinants of food security using logit model. In order to identify food security status of households and prevalence of chronic malnutrition status of children the study employed Household Food Insecurity Access Scale (HFIAS) and anthropometric measurement respectively. In terms of household food security status about 74% were moderately food insecure, symptomatic of compromising food quality more frequently has become a given in the study area. Moreover about 72.58% of children were found stunted; indicative of the prevalence of considerable rate of chronic malnutrition.