Food Security and Household Influencing Factors in Dire Dawa and Harar, Eastern Ethiopia, 2021

Background: Many households in urban areas suffer from severe food insecurity, and the current economic recession, pandemic, and conflict in the region have disproportionately aggravated the problems. Even if it is a social and public health challenge, the problems have been overlooked in the planning area. Measuring food security status in an urban setting is crucial to developing a sustainable and effective intervention. This study is designed to assess food security and household influencing factors in the eastern part of urban areas in Ethiopia. Materials and Methods: A community-based cross-sectional study was conducted to assess 616 households. Of the total of 616 samples, 405 were from Dire Dawa and 211 were from Harar, using simple random sampling. Validated questionnaires from previous studies were accustomed to collecting information. Three kebeles from Dire Dawa and three kebeles from Harar were selected using lottery methods. The data were collected by health extension workers. The information was entered into Epi-data version 3.02 and exported to SPSS version 21. To identify significant factors influencing household food insecurity, binary regression analysis was performed, and a P < 0.05 at a 95% confidence interval (CI) was considered statistically significant. Model fitness was checked using the Hosmer-Lemeshow test with a P > 0.05. Results: The prevalence of household food insecurity among urban residences in Dire Dawa and Harar was 41.7% [95% CI: 37.4–45.6]. The following factors were identified as influencing factors: household head sex (adjusted odds ratio [AOR] = 1.75, 95% CI: 1.08–2.84), household head education status (primary level) (AOR = 0.52, 95% CI: 0.33–0.99), household mother occupation (private business workers) (AOR = 0.3, 95% CI: 0.19–0.57), households with the medium wealth index (AOR = 1.72, 95% CI: 1.06–2.78) and households with the poorest wealth index (AOR = 4.01, 95% CI: 2.35–6.86). Conclusions: In this study, mild and moderate household food insecurity is increasing alarmingly. However, the prevalence of household food insecurity is low compared to the other findings. It is essential to design and implement appropriate small-scale household income generation systems for urban areas to tackle the food insecurity problem in the eastern parts of urban areas in Ethiopia.