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Food markets have been found to be, in many settings, important in shaping diets and nutritional outcomes. However, more evidence and improved metrics are needed to understand these relationships. We examined relationships between food market participation and household dietary diversity in populations of rural Malawi facing hunger and poor nutrition. We analysed, using Poisson regression, survey data from 400 households in two districts of rural Malawi in post-harvest and lean seasons of 2017/18. We also developed a new metric of food purchases to support our examination of food market participation. The findings include clear associations between food purchase diversity and household dietary diversity, and suggest households engaging more with food markets are more likely to have diversified diets and better nutrition.

The multiple burdens of persistent undernutrition and micronutrient deficiencies, along with the rapidly growing rates of overweight, obesity, and associated chronic diseases, are major challenges globally. The role of agriculture and the food system in meeting these challenges is very poorly understood. Achieving food security and addressing malnutrition in all its forms, a Sustainable Development Goal, requires an understanding of how changing food systems affect health outcomes and the development of new tools to design and evaluate interventions. An interinstitutional programme to address this interdisciplinary research challenge is described. Over the past seven years, the Leverhulme Centre for Integrative Research on Agriculture and Health has built a portfolio of successful and innovative research, trained a new cadre of interdisciplinary researchers in “Agri‐Health,” and built an international research community with a particular focus on strengthening research capacity in low‐ and middle‐income countries. The evolution of this programme is described, and key factors contributing to its success are discussed that may be of general value in designing interdisciplinary research programmes directed at supporting global development goals.

Time is a vital input into nutritional outcomes, as it is necessary for the production, procurement and preparation of food, child feeding and childcare. Thus, agricultural interventions may fail to improve nutritional outcomes if they do not take account of time constraints, particularly of rural women who spend a considerable portion of their time in agriculture. Given the potential trade-offs pertaining to time in productive vs. reproductive activities and its implications for maternal and child nutrition, the goal of this review is to systematically map and assess the available evidence, both qualitative and quantitative studies, agriculture-time use-nutrition pathway.\ud \ud Through an analysis of 89 studies, identified through a systematic search, on rural areas of low and middle-income countries, we observe three findings. First, women play a key role in agriculture, as reflected in their time commitments. Second, evidence from a very limited set of studies suggests that agricultural interventions tend to increase time commitments in agriculture of the household members for whom impact is measured. Third, while changing time use tends to change nutritional outcomes, it does so in a range of complex ways and there is no agreement on the impact. Nutritional impacts are varied because households and household members respond to increased time burden and workload in different ways.

Household air pollution from burning solid fuels is responsible for an estimated 2.9 million premature deaths worldwide each year and 4.5% of global disability-adjusted life years, while cooking and fuel collection pose a considerable time burden, particularly for women and children. Cleaner burning biomass-fuelled cookstoves have the potential to lower exposure to household air pollution as well as reduce fuelwood demand by increasing the combustion efficiency of cooking fires, which may in turn yield ancillary benefits in other domains. The present paper capitalises on opportunities offered by the Cooking and Pneumonia Study (CAPS), the largest randomised trial of biomass-fuelled cookstoves on health outcomes conducted to date, the design of which allows for the evaluation of additional outcomes at scale. This mixed methods study assesses the impact of cookstoves on primary school absenteeism in Karonga district, northern Malawi, in particular by conferring health and time and resource gains on young people aged 5–18. The analysis combines quantitative data from 6168 primary school students with in-depth interviews and focus group discussions carried out among 48 students in the same catchment area in 2016. Negative binomial regression models find no evidence that the cookstoves affected primary school absenteeism overall [IRR 0.92 (0.71–1.18), p = 0.51]. Qualitative analysis suggests that the cookstoves did not sufficiently improve household health to influence school attendance, while the time and resource burdens associated with cooking activities—although reduced in intervention households—were considered to be compatible with school attendance in both trial arms. More research is needed to assess whether the cookstoves influenced educational outcomes not captured by the attendance measure available, such as timely arrival to school or hours spent on homework.

Drawing on four years of fieldwork in Ethiopia and Uganda, this paper addresses gaps in knowledge about the mechanisms linking agricultural exports with poverty reduction, the functioning of rural labour markets, and the relevance to the lives of the poorest people of Fairtrade. Statistical analysis of survey evidence, complemented by qualitative research, highlights the relatively poor payment and non-pay working conditions of those employed in research sites dominated by Fairtrade producer organizations. We conclude that Fairtrade is not an effective way to improve the welfare of the poorest rural people.

Asset indices are ubiquitous in the debate about wellbeing in African countries, not least because of the paucity of traditional household income and expenditure data. Indeed, asset data have fuelled the creation of a new, more optimistic picture of wellbeing in Africa, where both income and the middle class are growing fast. This is the first review of the use of asset indices for African countries. Readers are guided through key debates over the use of asset data, including the use of assets to measure trends over time as well as socio-economic status and class. We argue that the theoretical and empirical advantages of the asset index over traditional welfare measures are clear, but that caution is needed. Most asset indices show significant improvements in private wealth and social welfare in African countries due to increases in the number of household assets and improvements in health and education. However, we argue that simplistic conclusions in the economics literature about the growth of income or of a ‘middle class’ using asset indices are poorly founded.

Given all the positivity and self-congratulation over HIV in the international policy world, it might be hard to remember how many lives have been destroyed and continue to be devastated by this illness. Looking to UNAIDS headlines, we hear of plans for an ‘AIDS-free generation in Africa’, ‘ending the epidemic by 2030’ and ‘eliminating stigma and discrimination’. In this case, the boldness of the goals is partly driven by what Michel Sidibe´, Executive Director of UNAIDS, called ‘game-changers’ in his World AIDS Day message in 2011. Biomedical revolutions seem to have radically altered the environment for HIV transmission: antiretrovirals (ARVs) and drugs to reduce mother-to-child trans- mission promise to cut HIV transmission rates, as does male medical circumcision.

Existing reviews on agriculture and nutrition consider limited evidence and focus on impact size, rather than impact pathway. This review overcomes the limitations of previous studies by considering a larger evidence base and exploring time as one of the agriculture-nutrition pathways. Agricultural development plays a role in improving nutrition. However, agricultural practices and interventions determine the amount of time dedicated to agricultural and domestic work. Time spent in agriculture—especially by women—competes with time needed for resting, childcare, and food preparation and can have unintended negative consequences for nutrition.

Los objetivos internacionales de educación incluidos en los Objetivos de Desarrollo del Milenio de la ONU (ODMs) han ejercido una influencia importante sobre los países del África Subsahariana. ¿Son capaces estos países de conseguir los variados objetivos de desarrollo adscritos a la educación, como reducción de la probreza, reducción de la mortalidad infantil, limitación de la fertilidad, mejoras en la recaudación de impuestos y crecimiento económico? De acuerdo con numerosos autores que han puesto en duda que la educación pueda cumplir con su papel de panacea, este articulo trata algunos mitos existentes en los ODM relativos a la educación. Dos de estos mitos son objeto de mayor interés. Primero, los ODM se centran en la educación primaria universal, ignorando todo lo que se conoce sobre los beneficios de la educación en los países del África Subsahariana. Segundo, los objetivos de educación se basan en el concepto de “capital humano”, que asume que la inversión en educación se puede asimilar a la inversión en capital físico y que genera una mayor productividad para el trabajador y crecimiento económico. Sin embargo, el enfoque del capital humano adolece de importantes debilidades y no resulta útil para analizar cómo las mejoras en educación puede favorecer el crecimiento en las economías africanas._____________________________________________The international education goals enshrined in the UN Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) have had a significant impact in sub-Saharan African countries. Are they likely to achieve the varied developmental roles ascribed to education, such as poverty reduction, improvements in child mortality, fertility decrease, increases in tax collection and rising economic growth? While several authors have questioned whether education generally can fulfil its ‘magic bullet’ role, this article will focus on some specific myths underlying the education MDGs. Two myths are of particular concern. First, these MDGs focus on universal primary education (UPE), ignoring what is known about the benefits of education in sub-Saharan African countries. Second, the MDG education goals are predicated on the concept of ‘human capital’, which assumes that investment in education can be treated like investment in physical capital and that it will lead to rising worker productivity and economic growth. However, the human capital approach is subject to fundamental weaknesses and is not a useful guide for the way that educational improvements are likely to impact on economic growth in African economies.

Ethnopharmacological relevanceHerbal medicine value chains have generally been overlooked compared with food commodities. Not surprisingly, revenue generation tends to be weighted towards the end of the chain and consequently the farmers and producers are the lowest paid beneficiaries. Value chains have an impact both on the livelihood of producers and on the composition and quality of products commonly sold locally and globally and consequently on the consumers. In order to understand the impact of value chains on the composition of products, we studied the production conditions for turmeric (Curcuma longa) and the metabolomic composition of products derived from it. We aimed at integrating these two components in order to gain a better understanding of the effect of different value chains on the livelihoods of some producers.Materials and methodsThis interdisciplinary project uses a mixed methods approach. Case studies were undertaken on two separate sites in India. Data was initially gathered on herbal medicine value chains by means of semi-structured interviews and non-participant observations. Samples were collected from locations in India, Europe and the USA and analysed using 1H NMR spectroscopy coupled with multivariate analysis software and with high performance thin layer chromatography (HPTLC).ResultsWe investigate medicinal plant value chains and interpret the impact different value chains have on some aspects of the livelihoods of producers in India and, for the first time, analytically assess the chemical variability and quality implications that different value chains may have on the products available to end users in Europe. There are benefits to farmers that belonged to an integrated chain and the resulting products were subject to a higher standard of processing and storage.By using analytical methods, including HPTLC and 1H NMR spectroscopy, it has been possible to correlate some variations in product composition for selected producers and identify strengths and weaknesses of some types of value chains. The two analytical techniques provide different and complementary data and together they can be used to effectively differentiate between a wide variety of crude drug powders and herbal medicinal products.ConclusionsThis project demonstrates that there is a need to study the links between producers and consumers of commodities produced in so-called ‘provider countries’ and that metabolomics offer a novel way of assessing the chemical variability along a value chain. This also has implications for understanding the impact this has on the livelihood of those along the value chain.

A collection of folklore and local history stories from Dún Gaill (Dungeel) (school) (Dungeel, Co. Kerry), collected as part of the Schools' Folklore Scheme, 1937-1938 under the supervision of teacher Liam de Róiste., Dungeel / Johnston, Deborah -- Nauntenane / Denehy, Berney -- Lismacfinnan / Murphy, Lily -- Coolbane -- Coolroe / Leary, Helen O' -- Dromin / Doona, Nellie -- Corbally / Nagle, Peggy -- Hidden Treasure / Roche, Breeda -- Hidden Treasures / Nagle, Peggy -- Hidden Treasure / Carthy, Queenie Mc -- Hidden Treasure / Murphy, Lily -- Hidden Treasure / Connor, Mary Ellen O' -- Hidden Treasure / Connor, Diarmuid -- Hidden Treasure / Dennehy, Berney -- Hidden Treasure / Leary, Deborah -- Hidden Treasure / Golden, Joaney -- Hidden Treasure -- Forts / Connor, Mary Ellen -- Forts of Coolroe / Leary, Helen O' -- Forts / Golden, Joaney -- Forts / Connor, Dermot -- Forts / Sullivan, John -- Forts of Lismacfinnan / Murphy, Lily -- Forts of Anglont / Russell, Patrick -- Forts / Carthy, Queenie Mc -- Forts of Coolbane / Murphy, Mossy -- Old Church / Roche, Breda -- Old Story / Sullivan, Jack -- Old Story / Golden, Joaney -- Old Story / Leary, Helen O' -- An Old Story / Leary, Deborah -- Old Story, Supported by funding from the Department of Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht (Ireland), University College Dublin, and the National Folklore Foundation (Fondúireacht Bhéaloideas Éireann), 2014-2016.