Determinants Of Acute Malnutrition Among Under-five Years Children
[A CASE STUDY OF ILLELA LOCAL GOVERNMENT SOKOTO STATE, NIGERIA]

2.4.3 MATERNAL OCCUPATION
Previous studies have found out that mother’s occupation is one of the determinants of under-five  malnutrition  in most developing countries.  A study in  Vietnam revealed that children from mothers who were labourers or farmers and housewives had a greater prevalence of stunting, underweight and wasting than those from mothers who worked in office or  were housewives  (Nguyen and  Kam,  2008).  This is because  working mothers rarely get time to take care of their children.  They also leave their children at home with other siblings who may neglect feeding them following the right frequency and this sometimes worsens the problem of malnutrition. It is also common for mothers to fail to provide complementary feeds including protein foods since most of them  cannot afford them  (Olwedoetal.,  2008; Rukundo 1988).  Such findings are true especially among peasant farmers in Arabaand Kalmalodistricts who spend most of their time in gardens leaving the under-five children under the care of other siblings or housemaids who are sometimes too young or illiterate on proper under-five nutrition practices.Mother’s  occupation is one of the  indicators  for  access to adequate food supplies, use of health services, availability of improved water sources, and sanitation facilities  which are prime determinants of child nutritional status (UNICEF, 1990). A study done on  most of the DHS surveys conducted in developing countries (Loaiza, 1997)  especially  in the Nations, Nationalities and Peoples Region (SNNPR) of Ethiopia  showed that  under-fivechildren from low economic status households were the most affected by malnutrition.
It is little wonder therefore that malnutrition was found to decrease with mother’s occupation although the pattern is not uniform according to UBOS and Macro International Inc., 2007 study that conducted the Uganda Demographic and Healthy Survey in 2006.  For working mothers, underfive child malnutrition could result from mothers’ neglect or care by a less skilled sibling or housemaid despite the fact that a wealthy family can hire a skilled and attentive nursemaid (Popkin et al., 1975).
According to a review of Demographic and Health Surveys in selected African countries, malnutrition is more prevalent among children whose mothers did not work for instanceaccording to DHS 1986-89, Burundi had 48% of stunted growth among children from non-working mothers while Zimbabwe had 31.0% of her children stunted among non-working mothers while 27.5% were among working mothers.  Wasting and  underweight were also more common  among the  children of  non-working  mothers  (Sommerfelt et  al.,  1994).  The above findings contradict study results where working mothers particularly crop cultivators had more chances of having malnourished children than their counterparts particularly pastoralists because they spent the bigger part of the day at home which helped them feed their children. In a study done in Botswana on the effect of  maternal occupation on under-five malnutrition, it was found out that  underweight occurred to a lesser extent among children whose mothers    worked  in agriculture  (7.5% in livestock and 28.6% for  those  working in crops) than among children  (40.0%) whose  mother  were involved in informal business (Salah and Nnyepi, 2006). Among mothers engaged in cultivation, a tendency of selling family food in a bid to get money has caused shortages and consequently increased cases of under-five child malnutrition (Zaramba, 1988).  The study findings in the districts of Araba and Kalmalorevealed that child malnutrition was higher among children born by mothers who were involved in cultivation as their occupation.
2.5 SUMMARY OF THE LITERATURE REVIEW
Whereas the literature reviewed indicates that malnutrition among children below five years is determined by several factors, a need to find out if similar factors are responsible for malnutrition in the districts of Araba and kalmalois quite important.  This is part of the research gap that this study seeks to examine.