Intra-household Resource Allocation after Rainfall Shocks

Talk by Ulugbek Aminjonov (University of Bordeaux) as part of the Research Seminar Series of the IOS Economics Department.

This paper investigates whether rainfall shocks affect the intra-household distribution of consumption in Malawi. Using four waves of household survey data and exploiting spatial-temporal rainfall variation across four agricultural growing seasons from 2010 to 2019, I estimate a resource allocation model to retrieve consumption shares for men women and children. The findings show that droughts tend to shift household resources from women and children to men. Welfare analyses indicate that women are more likely to bear the brunt of these shocks. This redistribution is likely linked to existing gender gaps in access to off-farm employment, which restrict women’s ability to contribute to household income when their farming activities are disrupted by droughts. In contrast, men’s relatively better access to off-farm work strengthens their role as the primary breadwinner, giving them greater access to household resources.