Rainfall shocks are not necessarily a sensitive early indicator of changes in wasting prevalence

Abstract

Evidence on the impact of weather shocks on child nutrition focuses on linear growth retardation (stunting) and thus, associates the effect of a short-term measure (weather events) on a cumulative measure (attained height). Relatively little is known on how weather shocks predict increases in wasting in a population. This study explores whether deviation in rainfall in Ethiopia, a drought prone country, is a sensitive indicator of future increases in wasting. Around 12% of children 0-23 months were wasted, but we found no consistent association between the rainfall shock variables and child weight-for-height Z-scores. The results indicate that monitoring rainfall does not provide a practical early warning to use for scaling up financing and management of preventative measures without additional information to increase precision.