Titolo della tesi: Essays on Food Security
This dissertation comprises three empirical essays on food security. Essay 1 (state level) develops a transparent, pillar-aligned composite index for West Africa (2001-2022), using principal component analysis to track availability, access, utilization, and stability over time. It documents improvements in availability/utilization aligned with persistent stability gaps.
Essay 2 (household level) links market instability to welfare by merging LSMS-ISA panels from Ethiopia, Tanzania, and Nigeria with CPI-deflated food prices and robust volatility measures. Country- and time-fixed-effects models relate volatility -distinct from price levels - to Food Consumption Scores (FCS), Household Dietary Diversity (HDDS), and the Reduced Coping Strategies Index (RCSI), with heterogeneity by rural/urban status, gender of household head, and net-seller position.
Essay 3 (personal level) uses the Indonesian Family Life Survey to estimate mixed-effects models of individual food consumption, highlighting the roles of education, employment, non-farm activity, and residence while accounting for regional structure.
Keywords: Food security; Price volatility; Household welfare; Dietary diversity; Composite index; Panel data; Fixed effects; Mixed effects; LSMS-ISA; IFLS; West Africa; Ethiopia; Tanzania; Nigeria; Indonesia; Political economy.