Conflict & Food Systems
Civil Conflicts and Household Food Expenditure Patterns: Evidence from Ghana
Conflict exposure significantly reshapes household consumption priorities, deepening food insecurity among vulnerable populations.
Overview
Conflict exposure significantly reshapes household consumption priorities, deepening food insecurity among vulnerable populations.
Proximity to conflict events shifts expenditure shares toward calories at the expense of nutrient-dense foods, persisting several survey rounds after violence subsides.
Advanced Economic Research
Key insight · Food and Energy Security (2025)
Key findings
- Female-headed households exhibit larger elasticities, consistent with labor-market disruptions and mobility constraints.
- Informal transfers partially buffer outcomes but are concentrated among already better-connected networks.
Motivation
Motivation
Humanitarian assessments focus on displacement and production losses; expenditure composition within stable villages near hotspots receives less attention yet drives hidden hunger.
Evidence
We geocode conflict incidents relative to enumeration areas and link to nationally representative expenditure diaries.
We geocode conflict incidents relative to enumeration areas and link to nationally representative expenditure diaries. Difference-in-differences with staggered exposure identifies localized expenditure pivots.
Placebo tests on non-food spending categories support a food-system interpretation rather than generic income shocks.
Female-headed households exhibit larger elasticities, consistent with labor-market disruptions and mobility constraints.
Advanced Economic Research
Conflict & Food Systems · 2025
Policy relevance
Policy relevance
Recovery packages should sequence cash with nutrient vouchers when markets are functional, rather than assuming uniform calorie adequacy implies dietary quality.
