Abstract
ABSTRACTAn important issue in research into access to healthy food is how best to compare the price of foods. The appropriate metric for comparison has been debated at length, with proponents variously stating that food prices should be compared in terms of their energy content, their edible mass, or their typical portion size. In this article we assessed the impact of using different food price metrics on the observed difference in price between food groups and categories of healthiness, using United Kingdom consumer price index data for 148 foods and beverages in 2012. We found that the choice of metric had a marked effect on the findings and conclude that this must be decided in advance to suit the reason for comparing food prices.
Highlights
An essential component of food access and food security is the notion that consumers have sufficient resources for a nutritious diet.[1]
Our results show that the unit of comparison has an impact on which foods were the most expensive. The effect of this can be to completely change the relationship observed, which has considerable implications for any research on food costs or food security. This finding is in line with previous work,[5,14] which found that fruits and vegetables went from being the most expensive to the least expensive food group depending on the price metric
We suggest that cost per unit of energy is the most appropriate metric for comparing the cost of different diets, given that the total diet should be within a specified level of energy intake based upon age, sex, basal metabolic rate, and physical activity levels, whereas the number of portions or the total mass of a diet can vary depending on the types of foods consumed, the typical portion size, and energy density of individual diets
Summary
An essential component of food access and food security is the notion that consumers have sufficient resources for a nutritious diet.[1] it is important to standardize methods for comparing the cost of different foods and beverages (hereafter collectively referred to as foods) to examine how prices may affect access to a nutritionally adequate diet. Though food prices are currently monitored by governments, international agencies, and private organizations, such tracking is usually not suitable for comparing the costs of different foods in relation to their nutritional value.[2] This has implications for monitoring food security, given that the relationship between nutritional value and prices is a factor that will have a large impact on food security. An inadequate understanding of how the prices of different foods compare could limit the effectiveness of food assistance and nutrition programmes, such as the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program in the United States or the UK’s Healthy Start, because
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