Climate change as a game changer: Rethinking Africa’s food security- health outcome nexus through a multi-sectoral lens

In Africa, the intricate relationship between food security and health outcomes is increasingly challenged by the unpredictable forces of climate change. With this in mind, we utilized panel data spanning from 2010-2022 for 46 African nations, sub-grouped into regional panels to analyze the moderating role of climate change on food security- health outcome nexus, contributing to Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) 2 (Zero Hunger), 3 (Good Health and Well-Being), and 13 (Climate Action). Considering issues of residual cross-sectional dependence and slope heterogeneity which are potential in panel data setting, the study utilized the Augmented Mean Group and the Common Correlated Mean Group techniques as the main methods in estimating the relationships amid the employed variables. Major outcomes from the study's analysis revealed that, across all panels of African states, there is no doubt that climate change has a substantial, direct detrimental impact on health outcomes. Also, while the moderating effect of climate change is clearly negative in the case of Northern and Central regional panels, it is significantly positive in the aggregated, Eastern, Western, and Southern African regions with regard to the relationship between food security and health outcomes. In light of these findings, addressing the relationship between food security and health in Africa while taking the moderating impacts of climate change into account requires a region-specific approach.