Clustering Of Stunting Prevalence with Gender Equality in Households Index and Socio-Demographic Variables In Regency/Cities Of Bali, West Nusa Tenggara And East Nusa Tenggara Provinces

Abstract

The issue of stunting is a primary focus of efforts to enhance the quality of human resources. The objective of the present study is to construct a gender equality index within households by grouping them according to the prevalence of stunting and other social indicators in the regencies/cities of Bali, West Nusa Tenggara, and East Nusa Tenggara provinces. The methodology used is based on the structural equation modelling partial least squares (SEM-PLS) approach and the Fuzzy C-Means (FCM] clustering algorithm, which were employed in the 2017 Indonesia Demographic and Health Survey (IDHS], the 2021 Indonesia Nutritional Status Survey, and the data published by the Statistics Indonesia (BPS). The province of Bali has the highest average Gender Equality Household Index score. The index size for low stunting prevalence clusters is higher than for high stunting prevalence clusters. The results indicated that regencies/cities with a high prevalence of stunting exhibited poor environmental sanitation conditions and lower Human Development Index (HDI) and Gender Equality Index (GEI] scores. Concurrently, there was a notable exclusive breastfeeding and low birth weight (LBW) prevalence. The formulation of this later can facilitate stakeholders in developing a roadmap to accelerate stunting control.