The Weight of Education: Nutritional Impacts of a Schooling Program in Bangladesh

The double burden of malnutrition-characterized by the coexistence of undernutrition and overnutrition-is an emerging public health challenge in many low- and middle-income countries, including Bangladesh. We examine the role of education in shaping long-term nutritional outcomes by leveraging the Female Secondary School Stipend Program (FSSSP), which provides stipends and tuition subsidies to rural girls. Using a difference-in-differences model that exploits variation in program exposure by birth cohort and rural residence, we show that the FSSSP led to substantial increases in secondary schooling among eligible cohorts. We also find that full exposure to the program reduced the probability of being underweight by 3 percentage points, and of being normal weight by 5.1 percentage points, while increasing the likelihood of being overweight and obese by 4.6 and 3.5 percentage points, respectively. These findings underscore the complex and sometimes unintended nutritional consequences of education programs in low-income settings undergoing rapid nutrition transitions.