Child malnutrition and school performance in China

World Bank Reprint Series: Number 393 Dean T. Jamison Cmld M4alnutrition and School Peirformnance minmCira Reprinted with permission from the Journal of Development Economics, vol. 20 (1986), pp. 299-309, published by Elsevier Science B.V., (North-Holland), Amsterdam.  Journal of Development Economics 20 (1986) 299-309. North-Holland CHILD MALNUTRITION AND SCHOOL PERFORMANCE IN CHINA* Dean T. JAMISON The World Batik, Washsington, DC 20433, USA Received October 1983, final version received August 1984 Data on the height, weight, age and grade level of over 3,000 children in five quite different locations in China allow computation of how far behind in school each child is, relative to where he should be given his age, as well as of the nutritional status variables of height-for-age, weight-for-age and weight-for-height. This paper uses these data to estimate the impact of the nutritional variables on the available measure of school performance. Children tend to be about one grade further behind in rural areas than in the provincial capitals, and about one-half a grade further behind in the provincial capitals than in Beijing. Even after controlling for location, however, lower nutritional status (particularly height-for-age) was found to affect school performance adversely; a one standard deviation reduction in height-for-age, for example, would result in a child's being about one-third of a year further behind. Though results from a geographically limited sample should be generalized only with substantial caution, and alternative interpretations of the data are possible, it does appear likely that malnutrition in rural China remained sufficiently prevalent in 1979 to retard the school advancement of large numbers of children. 1. Introduction Available evidence concerning the extent of child malnutrition in China has recently been reviewed.' While there was no indication of severe malnutrition in any of the regions for which data were available, the existence of widespread moderate malnutrition was documented. The extent and severity of malnutrition varied in the predictable way - urban areas are substantially better oft than rural ones, high-income rural areas are better off than low-income ones, and Northern provinces appear to be better off than Southern ones. The substantial prevalence of moderate malnutrition raises the question of the extent to which its existence is a matter of concern. While severe *The data on which this paper is based were provided to the World Bank's first economic mission to China, which visited the country in October-December, 1980. The report of that mission is now available [World Bank (1983)]. A more recent World Bank report [World Bank (1984)] includes further discussion of nutrition in China. The views expressed in this paper are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of the World Bank Group. Mrs. Kalpana Mehra provided expert research assistance in the preparation of this paper. 'See Jamison and Trowbridge (1983). 0304-3878/86/$3.50