To assess the status of women’s empowerment and its associated factors using multidimensional empowerment index in Tigray, Ethiopia.

Community-based cross-sectional study.

Tigray regional state, Ethiopia.

A sample of married pregnant women (n=1477) whose gestational age was at least 8 weeks were the study participants.

The primary outcome of the study was women’s empowerment status, assessed using 24 indicators across five key domains: decision-making power, social independence, attitudes towards violence against women, social networking and household asset ownership. Equal weight was assigned to all domains and the weight assigned to each domain was distributed equally to the indicators within the corresponding domain. Women who scored at least 80% (ie, met 4 out of 5 domains) were considered as empowered.

In total, only 8.2% (95% CI 6.9 to 9.78) of women were empowered. Intrafamilial factors: husband’s education with primary (adjusted OR (AOR): 2.66 (1.30 to 5.43), secondary AOR: 4.69 (2.23 to 9.84) and tertiary AOR: 3.60 (1.20 to 10.83)) levels, being from model households (AOR: 4.38 (1.33 to 14.47)), households with middle (AOR: 3.50 (1.13 to 8.37)) or high (AOR: 3.10 (1.25 to 7.67)) wealth index, enrolment in productive safety net programmes (AOR: 2.37 (1.25 to 4.50)) and age at first pregnancy (AOR: 1.16 (1.08 to 1.24)) were positively associated with women’s empowerment. From the community-level characteristics, dowry (AOR: 1.82 (1.10 to 5.30)) and perceived good availability of justice for women and girls (AOR: 3.00 (1.05 to 8.60)) were positively associated with women’s empowerment. Conversely, the history of an adverse pregnancy outcome was negatively associated with women’s empowerment (AOR: 0.51 (0.26 to 0.99)).

The overall status of women’s empowerment in Tigray was very low. Husband’s education, being model household, wealth index, enrolment in productive safety net programmes, dowry practice, perceived good availability of justice for women and girls and age at first pregnancy were found to be significant factors associated with women’s empowerment. In view of these empirical insights, several policy recommendations are proposed. First, interventions should focus on the identified associated factors, particularly in areas with lower empowerment scores such as partner’s education, improving access to justice for women, addressing harmful community practices such as dowry and strengthening household economic status through social protection and livelihood programmes. Second, the promotion of gender-balanced household dynamics through awareness campaigns and policy incentives could make a substantial contribution to women’s empowerment in the study area.