Search Results (32)

Time availability has been recognized as a social determinant of health. However, the association between time poverty and smoking behavior remains to be fully investigated. The aim of this current study was to examine the association between time poverty and smoking behavior by gender, marital status, and childrearing status, which differentially affect time resource availability. We used data from a population-based survey in the greater Tokyo metropolitan area. Participants were men and women aged 25–50 years (N = 2500). Time poverty was defined as a shortage of preferred leisure time compared to actual scheduled leisure time. Descriptive statistics and modified Poisson regression analyses were conducted, and stratified by gender. The study revealed that time poverty may relate to the prevalence of current smoking among single mothers with preschool-age children. However, this trend was not found for men. The findings suggest that time poverty may be heterogeneously associated with smoking propensity depending on gender-bound social roles and resources, which deserves further research for targeting appropriate interventions for health equity. Full article

The EU has consistently tackled the challenge of energy poverty (EP) through various legislative and non-legislative measures, particularly in the context of ongoing energy crisis, but it should also support the reduction of income inequality that might accelerate EP. The aim of this study is to evaluate the impact of income inequality on EP and other interconnected indicators in the EU in the period 2005–2023 using method of moments quantile (MMQ) regression and mean group (MG) estimators. The results suggest that income inequality based on Gini index enhances energy poverty, while gender pay gap, economic growth, and urban population reduce it. Foreign direct investment (FDI) and renewable energy consumption (REC) might combat EP only in the long-run. These findings suggest that macroeconomic policies should focus not only on economic growth, but also on addressing income inequalities. Policymakers must prioritize measures to reduce income inequality, such as progressive taxation or targeted social programs. Full article

Vaccinations are among the most effective means of preventing hospitalizations related to infections. Despite this, high hospitalization rates for vaccine-preventable diseases strain available healthcare resources and imply deficiencies in primary care. Barriers to vaccinations exist, such as the recent pandemic, vaccine hesitancy, misinformation, and access to care. This study analyzes hospitalization rates due to vaccine-preventable conditions and identifies factors contributing to an increase in these rates in the southeast United States. This study used data from four different data sources. The data covers four pre-pandemic years (2016 to 2019) and the pandemic period (2020 to 2022). The analysis categorized the numbers and rates of hospitalizations for conditions with an available preventative vaccine across three age groups: pre-school aged children, school-aged children, and adults. Comparisons between school- versus non-school-mandated vaccines and a focus on differences between rural versus urban communities, as well as demographic characteristics (i.e., gender, race, and ethnicity), are included. Chi-squared tests were used to assess differences in this descriptive part of the analysis. Linear multiple regression was used to examine the independent influence of geographic location while accounting for potential longitudinal trends and the dimensions of the SVI, including socioeconomic status, household composition, disability, minority status and language, and household type and transportation. The dataset included data from 22,797,826 inpatient episodes, including 32,358 for which the principal reason for hospitalization was a vaccine-preventable condition, not including COVID-19. The analysis shows a consistent pattern characterized by higher rates of hospitalization for counties classified as rural. The pattern holds for preschool age (p < 0.001), school age (p = 0.004), and adults (p = 0.009). The differences are statistically significant in the white population (p = 0.008); in pre-school children, school-age children, and adults (p < 0.001); in females (p = 0.08 in pre-school, and p = 0.013 in adults); and black adults (p = 0.02). The regression results confirmed the findings of the descriptive analysis, indicating significantly higher rates in rural communities. Finally, the regression analysis also showed significantly higher rates associated with greater social vulnerability. This study highlights gaps in vaccination opportunities. These gaps can be seen geographically and in terms of social vulnerability, affected by factors such as poverty, language barriers, household composition, and access to care. Hospitalizations due to immunizable diseases were found to be higher in rural areas, particularly among adults. Communities with a high SVI show a significant increase in hospitalization rates. Community-engaged vaccination outreach programs and state policies could improve vaccination rates, and therefore, public health in rural areas, reducing hospitalizations, and lowering infectious disease risks in these areas. Full article

In the context of Sustainable Development Goals, declining poverty (Goal 1), achieving gender equality (Goal 5), and ensuring access to clean and affordable energy (SDG7) are still behind track, and the gaps are not yet ready to be rapidly fulfilled. As part of Goal 7, energy consumption-related targets still lack the potential to be targeted. Considering these elements, this study aims to determine the impact of poverty and gender equality on the energy consumption of households in several European countries. Using data from 2010 to 2022 and the moments’ quantile regression method combined with a pooled OLS based on Driskoll-Kraay estimators, we found statistically significant results regarding the impact of poverty and gender on household energy consumption. These findings’ significance will direct policy design towards those meaningful tools that will increase energy efficiency, address energy poverty, and ensure energy just transition, leaving no one behind. Based on the main findings, the policymakers can understand that a mix of policies is significantly more efficient. In such circumstances, social and economic inequalities will not successfully address development issues without including key environmental priorities, such as emissions mitigation and energy consumption patterns. Full article

Mainstreaming gender issues in a demographically divided setting remains a critical component in policy frameworks and project designs. The focus of this study revolves around male- and female-headed households’ engagement in business operations, with an extended effect on household welfare. This study uses Malawi’s Integrated Household Survey 5, and answers two research questions: Are there any determinants of household engagement in non-farm businesses in rural and urban areas of Malawi? And is there any impact of gender differentials in household engagements in non-farm business operations on household welfare in rural and urban areas of Malawi? This study notes that male-managed non-farm SMEs had better profits compared with their female counterparts, as described by the Probit and the Oaxaca two-fold decomposition models. Mediation analysis was later used to establish the impact of the gender differentials using profits as the mediating variable. In general, females were found to be better off, but the benefits were insignificant in reducing the general rural–urban gap. This study recommends the provision of support towards credit structures for rural households and women-headed households; improved financial and business literacy for increased engagement in business operations and reduced poverty; and support towards advocacy of gender inclusion in economic empowerment approaches. Full article

Financial technology (FinTech) has become an indispensable part of most of the business infrastructure around the world. The FinTech ecosystem provides this solution by providing a suitable environment for all financial techno services to synergize. This paper explores the relationship between FinTech programs in Saudi Arabia and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). It highlights how these financial technology initiatives contribute to various SDGs by providing innovative solutions that enhance financial inclusion, improve access to essential services, and foster economic growth. Specifically, the study identifies connections between FinTech programs and SDG goals 1 (No Poverty), 2 (Zero Hunger), 5 (Gender Equality), 8 (Decent Work and Economic Growth), and 17 (Partnerships for the Goals). Through these linkages, this paper demonstrates the role of FinTech in promoting sustainable development and supporting national and global efforts to achieve these crucial objectives. Secondary data were collected from published reports, institutional and governmental websites, official portals, and research papers focusing on the companies operating in Saudi Arabia. It was found that FinTech in Saudi Arabia is addressing SDGs goals 1, 2, 5, 8 and 17. This paper further endeavors to map specific SDG indicators to the products and services provided by FinTech companies in Saudi Arabia. By doing so, it seeks to identify the areas where these technological solutions directly support the achievement of sustainable development targets. This comprehensive analysis is intended to be a valuable resource for institutions and policymakers in the FinTech industry. It provides insights into how these companies can align their offerings more closely with the SDG framework, thereby addressing any existing gaps. The findings aim to aid in the global agenda of eradicating poverty and promoting sustainable development opportunities by leveraging FinTech innovations. Full article

The feminisation of poverty is a complex, multidimensional phenomenon related to gender inequality in various aspects of life. Women are disproportionately affected by the gender pay gap, unequal intra-household resource distribution, unpaid domestic work, caregiving responsibilities, single motherhood, employment or educational barriers, violence, gender discrimination, and period poverty. Combating poverty and inequality are among the main goals of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development adopted by the United Nations General Assembly on 25 September 2015, and their great importance is further highlighted in the preamble of the resolution outlining the plan to transform our world by 2030. This study uses SDG indicators from the Eurostat database to assess the feminisation of poverty in the EU-27 member states in 2020 based on selected diagnostic characteristics mainly related to SDG 1 and SDG 5; they are also related to other goals due to the cross-cutting nature of the topic. The characteristics were transformed to reflect gender gaps and afterwards unitised with a veto threshold indicating gender balance. These were then used to calculate a synthetic taxonomic measure, allowing for linear ordering and classification of countries based on the feminisation of poverty levels. The study confirmed significant feminisation of poverty in the EU-27, with a few aspects showing masculinisation. High feminisation of poverty was observed in both emerging and advanced economies. Full article

Food insecurity is a critical issue in the Americas, with severe impacts in the Caribbean, Mesoamerica, and South America, particularly affecting older adults in Indigenous and rural contexts where it intersects with poverty, gender, and ethnicity. This study aims to provide an in-depth understanding of the current research about food insecurity among older Indigenous adults in Latin America and the Caribbean. A comprehensive literature review was conducted, utilizing specific search queries and the population, intervention, comparison, and outcome (PICO) strategy across multiple databases to identify the pertinent studies. The findings indicate an increase in academic output on this topic since 2018, with significant emphasis on the interplay between climate change and food insecurity. The review highlights the importance of developing targeted food programs, reforming policies, and fostering collaboration between academia and local communities to implement practical interventions. Despite the growing body of literature, a notable research gap persists in rural areas of Latin America and the Caribbean. This study underscores the necessity of balancing the geographic distribution of research and emphasizes the preservation of cultural practices and the adaptation of public policies to support traditional food practices. It advocates for culturally sensitive interventions and interdisciplinary collaboration to formulate comprehensive strategies. The originality and value of this study lie in its focused analysis of older Indigenous adults, contributing crucial insights to the international literature on food security. Full article

Among the multiple factors impeding equitable childhood immunization coverage in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs), gender barriers stand out as perhaps the most universal. Despite increasing recognition of the importance of gender considerations in immunization programming, there has not yet been a systematic assessment of the evidence on gender barriers to immunization. We conducted a scoping review to fill that gap, identifying 92 articles that described gender barriers to immunization. Studies documented a range of gender influencers across 43 countries in Africa and South Asia. The barrier to immunization coverage most frequently cited in the literature is women’s lack of autonomous decision-making. Access to immunization is significantly impacted by women’s time poverty; direct costs are also a barrier, particularly when female caregivers rely on family members to cover costs. Challenges with clinic readiness compound female caregiver’s time constraints. Some of the most important gender barriers lie outside of the usual purview of immunization programming but other barriers can be addressed with adaptations to vaccination programming. We can only know how important these barriers are with more research that measures the impact of programming on gender barriers to immunization coverage. Full article

Despite significant business-related research publications, extant studies are yet to show how well business research directly maps to 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Our study uses a qual-quant approach combining the PRISMA framework, performance analysis, and content analysis to find answers to this research gap. Using the Australia Business Deans Council list of 2500+ journals as a proxy for business research during 2016–2022, our study shows that only about 25% of business research is directly mapping to SDGs with SDG 3 (Good Health and Well Being) and SDG 7 (Affordable and Clean Energy) being the most mapped. The most cited journals are the Journal of Cleaner Production, Applied Energy, and the European Journal of Public, which largely focus on SDG 7, SDG 13 (Climate Action), and SDG 3. Top authors focus their research mainly on SDG 7, SDG 13, and SDG 12 (Responsible Consumption and Production), with few publications dedicated to SDG 1 (No Poverty), SDG 8 (Decent Work and Economic Growth), and SDG 5 (Gender Equality). Applied Economics has emerged as the dominant field for SDGs. Further, our study is the first to incorporate social network analysis to understand the interconnected nature of SDGs in the context of business research. This research provides substantial policy insight, particularly insight relevant to the formulation of regulations that promote the alignment of business researchers with SDGs. Full article

Attaining economic parity and reducing poverty between the genders are critical steps toward attaining the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals. Despite progress, women in the US still earn USD 0.83 for every USD 1.00 that a man earns. With rising shares of single/female-headed households with children in American society in recent years, such gaps in earnings exacerbate the misery of children living in such households. In 2019, female-headed households with children had poverty rates almost twice (36.5%) that of single/male-headed families (16.3%). This paper uses five-year American Community Survey estimates from the National Historical Geographic Information System to empirically examine the spatial distribution and determinants of female-versus-male-headed households with children living in poverty in the counties of the USA. Lower levels of educational attainment are associated with higher levels of poverty for both genders. A bachelor’s degree in education is associated with higher poverty for female-headed households, whereas majoring in business, sciences, engineering, and arts/humanities is associated with lower poverty for male-headed households. Service-sector occupations inherently contribute to higher poverty for both groups. Over-representation in management/professional and natural-resources, construction, and maintenance-type occupations works well for male-headed households, whereas management/professional, sales/office, and service-based occupations associate with higher poverty for female-headed households—pointing toward the “working poor”—comprising largely of the active female labor force in the new economy. Full- and part-time work status alleviates poverty for female-headed households, whereas part-time work is associated with higher poverty for males. Full article

Despite the persistent income inequality and climate change shocks in Africa, there is limited research on their effects on food security. Hence, this study adopted a mixed-methods approach including a bibliometric analysis and content analysis to examine emerging themes in the literature on climate change, inequality and poverty, and food insecurity in Africa. The bibliometric data used were retrieved from the Scopus database for the period 2000–2022. The exercise revealed an increasing trend in the number of publications in the field, as well as strong collaboration between African countries. Specifically, most of the leading research was published by Kenyan, USA, and UK institutes. From the analysis, seven themes emerged; namely; (1) the impact of governance and policy on poverty alleviation, nutrition status, and food security; (2) the role of innovation and sustainable agriculture in mitigating climate change in developing countries; (3) integrating gender in evaluations of the impact of climate change on food security and livelihoods in Africa; (4) climate change adaptation among smallholders in building resilience for nutrition; (5) the role of institutions in assisting smallholders mitigate and adapt to climate shocks; (6) inequality, food unavailability, and agricultural production; and (7) gendered impacts of climate-smart agriculture in climate adaptation and mitigation. We also found out that there was a dearth of longitudinal studies on these seven themes. Another key element revealed by the study was the lack of policies that address the gender-differentiated impacts of climate change; hence, there is limited research on the agricultural gender productivity gap. Policies based on the tenants of socio-economic inclusion need to guide the distribution of wealth and economic participation in order to reduce inequality and improve food security and nutrition outcomes. Full article

Land is the key asset in the agricultural sector and hence land policy is one of the key elements that determine whether SDGs are achieved in developing counties or not. In developing countries, land titling programs have been seen as a strategy for addressing SDGs. Even though the government of Ethiopia launched the rural land registration and certification program (LRCP) to secure the land rights of rural households in 1998, currently, there are limited empirical studies to examine the contribution of LRCP in addressing sustainable development goals (SDGs). This study is employed to fill this knowledge gap by assessing how LRCP supports the achievement of the UN SDGs. The research data were collected through key informant interviews, in-depth interviews, focus group discussions, and reviewing published and unpublished documents. Content analysis, narrative analysis, and SWOT analysis were applied to examine the research data. The study confirms that LRCP improves tenure security, which greatly contributes to the achievements of SDGs, such as SDG 1 (end poverty), SDG 2 (end hunger), SDG 5 (gender equality), and SDG 15 (life on land). The tenure security of rural societies is a key pathway for the achievement of SDGs in Ethiopia since their livelihood mainly depends on agriculture. Therefore, developing countries should focus on land rights to improve the livelihoods of rural societies in particular and to enable sustainable development in general. Full article

Reducing adolescent childbearing is a global priority, and enabling contraceptive use is one means of achieving this. Upstream factors, e.g., gender inequalities, fertility norms, poverty, empowerment and schooling, can be major factors affecting contraceptive use. We conducted a systematic map to understand which structural adolescent contraception interventions targeting these upstream factors have been evaluated in LMICs. We searched eight academic databases plus relevant websites and a 2016 evidence gap map and screened references based on set inclusion criteria. We screened 6993 references and included 40 unique intervention evaluations, reported in 138 papers. Seventeen evaluations were reported only in grey literature. Poverty reduction/economic empowerment interventions were the most common structural intervention, followed by interventions to increase schooling (e.g., through legislation or cash transfers) and those aiming to change social norms. Half of the evaluations were RCTs. There was variation in the timing of endline outcome data collection and the outcome measures used. A range of structural interventions have been evaluated for their effect on adolescent contraceptive use/pregnancy. These interventions, and their evaluations, are heterogenous in numerous ways. Improved understandings of how structural interventions work, as well as addressing evaluation challenges, are needed to facilitate progress in enabling adolescent contraceptive use in LMICs. Full article

The present narrative review aimed to analyze the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the sustainable development goals (SDGS). This information would allow a better comprehension of the actual state of the SDGS and a more efficient programming in future interventions. To achieve the objective of the study, a consensual and critical review was carried out using both primary sources, such as scientific articles, and secondary sources, such as bibliographic indexes, web pages and databases. The Sustainable Development Goals are a global call to action to end poverty, close the gender gap, protect the planet, and improve the lives of people around the world. In 2015, the United Nations General Assembly adopted 17 goals as part of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, which sets out a plan to achieve the goals in 15 years. However, the COVID-19 pandemic crisis has been a turning point in the achievement of these goals, due to all its consequences at the political, economic, and socio-cultural levels. This review can be used as a guide for future research and reviews in order to understand the status of each of the SDGs and what actions have been taken and proposed in the aftermath of the pandemic in recent years. Full article