EIEE Webinar-Seminar
3 November 2025, 12:00 CET
To join the webinar, register here
Speaker: Francois Cohen, University of Barcelona
Moderator: Francesco Granella, CMCC
Little is known about household-level interventions to strengthen resilience to food insecurity. Rapid electrification could enable refrigeration and transform how food is stored, prepared, and consumed. This study provides the first causal evidence on how access to refrigeration affects food insecurity and dietary quality in a low-income country. The identification strategy exploits appliance breakdowns, comparing households with functioning and broken refrigerators purchased at the same time and at similar prices. Losing access to refrigeration increases food insecurity by one third and reduces consumption of animal-sourced foods, lowering intake of vitamin B12. Refrigeration is an overlooked lever to improve diets and reduce micronutrient deficiencies.