TY - JOUR
T1 - Integrating poverty alleviation and environmental protection efforts
T2 - A socio-ecological perspective on menstrual health management
AU - Angeli, Federica
AU - Jaiswal, Anand Kumar
AU - Shrivastava, Saumya
N1 - © 2022 The Authors.
PY - 2022/12/1
Y1 - 2022/12/1
N2 - Apt menstrual health management is crucial to the livelihood of low-income, bottom of the pyramid (BOP) women as well as to environmental conservation. However, knowledge is still scant about the factors underpinning women's preferences towards menstrual products, and whether and how the environmental impact of different solutions matter to women's choices. We address this gap by proposing a socio-ecological perspective to understand whether a product's low environmental impact enhances low-income women's uptake of sanitary napkins, thereby supporting poverty alleviation objectives but also efforts geared towards environmental protection. Results from a discrete-choice experiment involving 164 women (n = 1148) in two Indian slums in Delhi and Ahmedabad show that sanitary products' biodegradability is the most important attribute affecting women's preferences towards menstrual hygiene management solutions, which also significantly interacts with women's socio-economic and socio-cultural characteristics. Our findings highlight the potential for business models to find positive synergies between environmental protection and poverty alleviation goals and to situate solutions within the larger socio-ecological context of receiving communities.
AB - Apt menstrual health management is crucial to the livelihood of low-income, bottom of the pyramid (BOP) women as well as to environmental conservation. However, knowledge is still scant about the factors underpinning women's preferences towards menstrual products, and whether and how the environmental impact of different solutions matter to women's choices. We address this gap by proposing a socio-ecological perspective to understand whether a product's low environmental impact enhances low-income women's uptake of sanitary napkins, thereby supporting poverty alleviation objectives but also efforts geared towards environmental protection. Results from a discrete-choice experiment involving 164 women (n = 1148) in two Indian slums in Delhi and Ahmedabad show that sanitary products' biodegradability is the most important attribute affecting women's preferences towards menstrual hygiene management solutions, which also significantly interacts with women's socio-economic and socio-cultural characteristics. Our findings highlight the potential for business models to find positive synergies between environmental protection and poverty alleviation goals and to situate solutions within the larger socio-ecological context of receiving communities.
U2 - 10.1016/j.socscimed.2022.115427
DO - 10.1016/j.socscimed.2022.115427
M3 - Article
C2 - 36306690
SN - 0277-9536
VL - 314
JO - Social Science & Medicine
JF - Social Science & Medicine
M1 - 115427
ER -