Dietary behaviors, diet quality and nutritional status of motorcycle taxi (zémidjan) drivers in Cotonou, Benin: a cross-sectional study
This cross-sectional study of 253 motorcycle taxi drivers in Cotonou, Benin, reveals a coexisting double burden of underweight and overweight driven by a poorly diversified, carbohydrate-dominant diet, with low dietary diversity linked to underweight and alcohol consumption associated with overweight.
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In the bustling cities of West Africa, a quiet nutritional shift is taking place. As urban life accelerates, the food people eat is becoming richer in calories, sugar, and fat, while the physical activity required for daily life is shrinking. This transition creates a complex health challenge where people can suffer from too little nutrition and too much weight gain at the same time. While much attention has been paid to how these changes affect the general population, a specific group of workers has largely been overlooked: those who drive for a living in the informal sector. These individuals, who rely on daily earnings to feed their families, often spend their entire workday on the road, eating whatever is available from street vendors rather than sitting down for a home-cooked meal. Understanding what they eat and how it affects their bodies is crucial, because their work environment creates unique pressures that standard health advice often fails to address.
A recent study in Cotonou, Benin, turned its attention to the zémidjans, the motorcycle taxi drivers who are a vital part of the city's transport network. These drivers spend hours navigating traffic, often without a fixed schedule or a predictable place to eat. Researchers wanted to know exactly what these men were consuming, how diverse their diets were, and what their physical health looked like. To find out, the team surveyed 253 drivers across different neighborhoods in the city. They did not just ask general questions; they carefully recorded what each driver had eaten in the last day and the last week, measured their height and weight, and asked about their work habits, income, and daily routines. The goal was to paint a clear picture of the relationship between their mobile lifestyle and their nutritional well-being.
The results revealed a diet that is heavily skewed toward carbohydrates. The drivers ate a median of 2,300 calories per day, which is slightly below the recommended amount for their level of activity, but the quality of those calories was the real issue. Nearly 70 percent of their energy came from carbohydrates, primarily from cereals and tubers like yams and cassava, which they consumed almost every day. In contrast, they ate very little protein and fat. While the recommended diet should include a balanced mix of these nutrients, the drivers' intake of protein was less than 9 percent of their total energy, and fat was only about 14 percent. This imbalance was driven by cost and availability; with many drivers earning less than 100,000 West African CFA francs a month, expensive foods like meat, fish, eggs, and fresh fruit were rare. Instead, their meals were often simple, consisting of starchy staples and oil, eaten alone and driven by hunger rather than a set schedule.
Despite this poor diet quality, the study found a surprising mix of physical conditions among the drivers. About 8 percent of the men were underweight, struggling to get enough food to maintain a healthy weight. However, a much larger group faced the opposite problem: one-third of the drivers were either overweight or obese. This coexistence of undernutrition and overnutrition within the same group is a hallmark of the "double burden" of malnutrition. The researchers discovered that the drivers who ate the least varied diets were significantly more likely to be underweight. On the other hand, those who drank alcohol were much more likely to be overweight, regardless of their income or other factors. Interestingly, a standard measure of food security suggested that almost all the drivers had "acceptable" food consumption, but the researchers noted this was misleading. That measure simply checks if people have enough calories from staple foods, not whether those foods provide the vitamins and proteins the body actually needs.
The study highlights that the health of these drivers is deeply tied to the constraints of their work. They cannot easily plan their meals or choose nutritious options when they are constantly moving and dependent on daily cash. The findings suggest that simply telling drivers to eat better is not enough. Because their choices are limited by what is cheap and available at the roadside parking spots where they eat, any solution must involve changing the food supply itself. The researchers propose that driver associations could work with health services to improve the quality of food available at these stops and to address habits like alcohol consumption. Until then, the zémidjans of Cotonou continue to navigate the city on a diet that keeps them moving but leaves their long-term health vulnerable to both hunger and excess weight.
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