The recognition that the HIV/AIDS epidemic is a major threat to sub-Saharan Africa’s economic development has prompted researchers to focus on the economic impacts of the disease. In particular, given the importance of agriculture for livelihoods in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA), researchers have investigated the impact of HIV/AIDS on agriculture. Relatively little research has focused on the role agriculture plays in fueling the spread of HIV/AIDS. This study addresses this gap in the literature and examines how agricultural contexts in Kenya influence women’s vulnerability to HIV/AIDS. The study uses a regional analysis of Kenya using districts (similar to U.S counties) as administrative units and employs multilevel analysis to examine the impact of the regional agricultural context on women’s vulnerability to HIV/AIDS.
This study refers to regional agricultural contexts as agricultural-consumption regimes (ACRs). The term agricultural-consumption regimes (ACRs) draws from longstanding literature which examines how agricultural development in developing countries impacts women’s agricultural productivity, hence their ability to fulfill the consumption needs of their households. ACRs encompass the key production-related factors in the women and development literature - agricultural commercialization (cash crop versus food crop production), land tenure, access to credit, and access to extension services. ACRs also include household survival strategies that women employ to counter constraints in agricultural production such as opportunities for wage employment, membership in cooperatives, and women’s organizations. In examining the impacts of ACRs on women’s vulnerability to HIV/AIDS, the study also takes into account women’s decision-making autonomy and household food security. There is consensus in the HIV/AIDS literature that power imbalances in the household are a major factor driving women’s vulnerability to this disease in sub-Saharan Africa, thus, the importance of examining the links between women’s decision-making autonomy and HIV/AIDS. Regarding household food security, researchers have suggested that people who are food insecure are less likely to act on their knowledge about HIV to prevent infection. Greater household food insecurity may thus increase women’s vulnerability to HIV/AIDS.
This study assesses the extent to which ACRs influence women’s vulnerability to HIV/AIDS net of individual and household-level characteristics such as women’s decision-making autonomy and household food security.
The study finds that at the contextual level, after taking into account women’s decision-making autonomy and household food security, women’s tenure security, land holding sizes, cash crop production and membership in women’s is associated with lower vulnerability to HIV/AIDS. By contrast, wage employment, access to credit (proportion of households that were able to access credit in the district) and land titling (proportion of household in the districts with title to land) is associated with women’s increased vulnerability to HIV/AIDS.
The study shows that claims made in the women in development (WID) cross-national literature that context matters for women’s well-being are supported at the sub-national scale, although some relationships are not consistent in all directions with the aforementioned literature. In terms of policy, efforts to safeguard women’s rights to property such as land may be an important component not only for poverty alleviation, but also for HIV/AIDS prevention strategies.