Food for Thought: Impacts of Market Integration on Diet and Health in Indigenous Communities in the Northern Ecuadorian Amazon

This project examines the relationships between market integration, dietary quality, and objective health measures in four of the indigenous peoples living the Northern Ecuadorian Amazon. Ascertaining dietary quality was undertaken by determining Food Variety Scores (FVS) and Diet Diversity Scores based on three different weighting systems—Unweighted Diet Diveristy Score (UWDDS), Protein Weighted Diet Diversity Score (PWDDS), and Value Weighted Diet Diversity Score (VWDDS)—to represent the variety and diversity of foods being eaten in the seven study communities. Objective health measures—BMI, skinfold measurements and z-scores, hemoglobin, and symptoms of illness—were analyzed to provide a picture of the health experienced by people living in these communities. The diet scores were related to measures of market integration based on household time allocation to determine how diet could have changed and how that related to changes in market integration. . It was found that highest diet diversity scores occurred where the largest amount of time spent buying, leading to the conclusion that these communities are utilizing both market and traditional food sources to maximize the their use of accessible foods. The diet scores were then related to health to show how differences in dietary quality impacted health in these communities. The relationships between health and diet quality were mixed, but the high variability in some of the skinfold z-scores and the presence of overweight and obesity in these communities suggest a trend of increasing risk for poor health in these populations as the first concrete impacts of increasing market integration on health are seen. Further research is needed to support this and to more fully understand how market integration is affecting diet and health in these communities.Bachelor of Art