Mishra, Narbadeshwar
ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-2727-2626 and Mukhopadhyay, Jyoti Prasad
(2026)
Does Nutrition‐Led Multifaceted Program Impact Adolescent Girls' Educational and Learning Outcomes? Evidence From India.
Health Economics.
ISSN 1057-9230
(In Press)
Does Nutrition‐Led Multifaceted Program Impact.pdf - Published Version
Restricted to Repository staff only
Download (1MB) | Request a copy
Abstract
While extensive literature is available on the impact of early childhood nutritional food program on human capital gains, little we know about the impact of targeted nutritious food provisioning at a later stage on human capital gains. This paper fills this gap in the literature. We examine the causal impact of the Rajiv Gandhi Scheme for Empowerment of Adolescent Girls (SABLA), a nutrition‐led multifaceted program for adolescent girls aged 11–18 years introduced by the central government in India in 2010, on girls' educational and learning outcomes. The implementation of this program provides us with enough variation in treatment. We glean data from multiple nationally representative datasets and employ difference‐in‐differences framework to estimate the causal impact of the SABLA program. Our results indicate that the program significantly improved enrollment and basic learning outcomes, including reading ability and math skills. We attribute the salutary effects of the program to significant improvement in health status (BMI and weight) of the adolescent girls exposed to the program and increased child‐specific educational expenditure. Our findings are consistent across different datasets, and robust to potential confounding factors, and alternative empirical specifications.
| Item Type: | Article |
|---|---|
| Uncontrolled Keywords: | Difference‐in‐differences | Education | Health | Human capital | SABLA |
| Subjects: | Social Sciences and humanities > Social Sciences > Gender Studies Social Sciences and humanities > Social Sciences > Health (Social sciences) Social Sciences and humanities > Social Sciences > Public Policy |
| Depositing User: | Mr. Syed Anas |
| Date Deposited: | 08 Jun 2026 10:20 |
| Last Modified: | 08 Jun 2026 10:20 |
| Official URL: | https://doi.org/10.1002/hec.70114 |
| URI: | https://pure.jgu.edu.in/id/eprint/11546 |
Downloads
Downloads per month over past year
Dimensions
Dimensions