Dynamic linkages between fisheries output, official development assistance, and household consumption in Somalia

Despite substantial research on household consumption, limited evidence exists for fragile economies such as Somalia, where climate shocks, institutional fragility, and macroeconomic volatility interact. This study estimates the dynamic effects of fisheries output, development food aid (as the ODA channel), trade openness, GDP per capita, government expenditure, and total population on household consumption in Somalia over 1980–2022 using annual time-series data. Stationarity is tested using the Augmented Dickey–Fuller (ADF) procedure, and dynamic relationships are estimated through the ARDL bounds approach, with FMOLS, DOLS, and CCR used as robustness checks. The findings confirm cointegration among the variables: in the long run, GDP per capita, trade openness, and fisheries output are positively associated with household consumption, while government expenditure and food-aid ODA show negative effects, and total population is positive but statistically weaker in the baseline long-run ARDL equation. In the short run, fisheries output, GDP per capita, trade openness, and population increase consumption, whereas government expenditure and food-aid ODA reduce it; the error-correction term is negative and significant, indicating rapid adjustment toward equilibrium. Overall, the results suggest that household consumption in Somalia is driven primarily by domestic income, market integration, and demographic scale, while the aid effect is modest and channel-specific, offering targeted policy implications for fisheries upgrading, aid effectiveness, and expenditure quality.