Improved Dairy Cows in Uganda: Pathways to Poverty Alleviation and Improved Child Nutrition

Abstract

Objectives: The objective of this study was to rigorously assess the impact of improved dairy cow breeds adoption on the following outcome levels: (i) Enterprise—milk productivity, own-milk consumption and milk commercialization; (ii) Household—the number of meals household consumes, food and non-food expenditure, food and non-food poverty incidences, poverty depths and severity; (iii) Individual child-level nutrition—stunting and wasting of children below 5 years. Methods: We use a nationally representative primary dataset that was recently collected from Ugandan households of rural and urban settings. We employ modern impact assessment methods that account for selection bias to achieve consistent estimates. Results: We find that adopting improved dairy cows significantly increases milk productivity, milk commercialization and food expenditure. Consequently, adoption substantially reduces household poverty and stunting for young children below 5 years. These results are consistent with the perceived role of new agro-technologies. Considering heterogeneity in farm size, we further find that households with small farms increase milk yield, food expenditure and reduce poverty substantially due to adoption while large farms increase own-milk consumption and commercialization but also reduce stunting of children below 5 years. This suggests that the nutritional benefits of adoption may not sufficiently help reduce child malnutrition for young children living on small farms. Conclusions: We argue that for holistic and sustainable improvements in broader welfare and nutrition outcomes, agricultural development programs should be accompanied with related programs on gender empowerment, nutrition education, as well as food safety and hygiene.