The influence of asset ownership and e-marketing on households’ dietary diversity in rural South Africa

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Abstract Integrating rural populations into formal food markets is widely recognized as a key strategy for enhancing dietary diversity. However, there is limited research on the impact of e-marketing on improving household dietary diversity. This study seeks to fill this gap by evaluating how food retailers’ use of text messaging to communicate food offerings affects dietary diversity. Specifically, the study compares the influence of e-marketing, enabled by mobile phone ownership, with the impact of assets such as financial, human, physical, and agricultural capital. Using a multinomial regression model, data from 166 households in the Moretele Local Municipality in South Africa were analyzed. The results indicate that receiving marketing messages from retailers, as well as asset ownership, positively influenced household dietary diversity. This finding underscores the potential of targeted e-marketing in improving diet quality and suggests that text messaging can be an effective tool for promoting healthier food choices. The study also highlights key assets that development programs should prioritize to help rural communities transition to more nutritious diets.