Local Food Prices Research Articles

Escalating Food Prices: The Threat to Poor Households and Policies to Safeguard a Recovery for All

This working paper: (i) briefly reviews possible causes of the food price spike that began in mid-2010; (ii) examines recent local food price movements in 58 developing countries during 2010; (iii) discusses the adverse impacts of food price increases on households; (iv) presents a rapid desk review of international and domestic policy responses in 98 developing countries under a three-pillar policy framework - supporting consumption, boosting production and regulating/managing food markets; and (v) calls for urgent and coordinated policy actions by national governments and the international community.

Pass-through of International Food Prices to Domestic Inflation During and After the Great Recession: Evidence from a Set of Latin American Economies

We looked at how international food price shocks have impacted local inflation processes in Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Mexico, and Peru in the past decade. Using impulse-response analysis coming from cointegrated vars, we find that international food inflation shocks take from one to six quarters to pass through to domestic headline inflation, depending on the country. In addition, by calculating the elasticity of local prices to an international food price shock, we found that this pass-through is not complete. We also take a closer look at how this type of shock affects local food and core prices separately, and asses the possibility second round effects over core inflation stemming from the shock. We find that a transmission to headline prices does occur, and that part of the transmission is associated with rising core prices both directly and through possible second round effects, which implies a role for monetary policy when such a shock takes place. This is especially relevant given that international food prices have recently followed an upward trend after falling considerably during the Great Recession.

Living on a Spike: How is the 2011 Food Price Crisis Affecting Poor People?

Living on a Spike: How is the 2011 Food Price Crisis Affecting Poor People?

Higher Food Prices in Sub-Saharan Africa: Poverty Impact and Policy Responses

The spike in global food prices in 2008 led to significantly higher food prices across the developing world. Global commodity prices have since fallen but remain volatile, and local food prices remain high in many countries. The authors review the evidence on the potential impact of higher food prices on poverty, focusing on Sub-Saharan Africa, and examine the extent to which policy responses are able to protect the poor. They show that rising food prices are likely to lead to higher poverty in Sub-Saharan Africa as the negative impact on net consumers outweighs the benefits to producers. A recent survey shows that the most common policy response in Sub-Saharan African countries in 2008 was reducing taxes on food, while outside the region subsidies were the most popular measure. Sub-Saharan African countries also have a higher prevalence of food based safety net programs, some of which were scaled up to respond to rising prices. The review suggests that the benefits from reducing import tariffs on staples are likely to accrue largely to the non-poor. Safety net programs can be more effective, but geographic targeting and other investments to strengthen safety nets are necessary to ensure that fewer people are affected by future crises.

Less-energy-dense diets of low-income women in California are associated with higher energy-adjusted diet costs

Background: US-based studies are needed to estimate the relation, if any, between diet quality and estimated diet costs.Objective: We hypothesized that lower cost diets among low-income women in California would be energy dense but nutrient poor.Design: Energy and nutrient intakes for 112 women aged 18–45 y living in California were obtained with a food-frequency instrument. Dietary energy density (in MJ/kg or kcal/g) and energy-adjusted diet costs (in $/10 MJ or $/2000 kcal) were calculated with local food prices. Tertile splits of energy density and energy cost were analyzed with one-factor analysis of variance.Results: Mean daily energy intake excluding all beverages was 7.1 MJ (1699 kcal), and mean dietary energy density was 6.5 kJ/kg (1.54 kcal/g). Lower dietary energy density was associated with significantly higher intakes of dietary fiber (P = 0.004), vitamin A (P < 0.001), and vitamin C (P < 0.001) and with significantly lower intakes of total fat (P = 0.003) and saturated fat (P < 0.001). Higher diet cost was associated with significantly lower dietary energy density (P < 0.001), total fat (P = 0.024), and saturated fat (P = 0.025) and with significantly higher intakes of vitamins A (P = 0.003) and C (P < 0.001). Each additional dollar in estimated diet costs was associated with a drop in energy density of 0.94 MJ/kg (0.225 kcal/g).Conclusions: The finding that higher quality diets were more costly for these low-income women has implications for the food assistance and education programs of the US Department of Agriculture. Policy interventions may be required to allow low-income families in the United States to improve the quality of their diets given their food budget constraints.

The Effects of the Local Food Environment and Social Support on Rural Food Insecurity

ABSTRACT Local food environments and the social relationships of people across rural communities are part of the infrastructure that supports rural quality of life. In this study, we examine the relationship between a weak food infrastructure and rural food insecurity to discover differences among rural places in the American Midwest. We find that high local food prices and an inadequate number of food stores are viewed by families as obstacles to meeting their food needs. Some households counteract the local environment by shopping outside the county, farming, or relying on informal support networks. Transportation difficulties exacerbate food acquisition problems, while institutional support provided through food programs is not always effective. Implications for involving low-income rural families in program development are provided.

Local Food Price Analysis by Linear Programming: A New Approach to Assess the Economic Value of Fortified Food Supplements

Linear programming can be applied to identify a nutritionally adequate diet of the lowest cost, since price and nutrient contents are linearly related to food weight. Most computer spreadsheets now include an easy-to-use solver function that is suitable for this purpose. This approach can also be used to estimate the effect of introducing a food supplement on the minimal cost required to provide a nutritionally adequate diet. It can also provide an estimate of the expenses saved by families in relation to the sums spent by the donor after the distribution of a food supplement. This method is illustrated by comparing the economic value of two food supplements, a traditional blended flour and a nutrient-dense spread (a “foodlet”) in rural Chad. The limitations of this approach and the need to interpret its findings carefully in relation to field observations are discussed.

Malnutrition and income: Are we being misled? (A dissenting view about a confusing literature)

This article takes issue with mainstream evidence in the literature purporting to show that increasing household income alone is not enough to do something significant towards combatting malnutrition in the world. It argues that poverty lines used as a threshold to surpass (in order to show measurable improvements in the nutritional status of vulnerable women and children in the short term) are too low. It further points out that the primary determinant of nutritional status of young children may actually not be total household income, but rather that portion of it earned and controlled by the mother. Modernization and market expansion have created consumption preferences that compete with food as a need thus leading to decreasing percentages of household income being spent on food. With competing expenditure options, the relative poverty line for a given location (based on current local food prices plus the prices of other needs) is clearly at a higher household income cut‐off point than the absolute poverty line that researchers reviewed are using as a threshold. Households that raise their income barely beyond the poverty‐line‐set‐too‐low still do not show the expected improvements in the nutritional status of vulnerable household members. The point is made that poverty alleviation of an order of magnitude significantly beyond absolute poverty is needed for lasting nutritional improvement to occur; providing for an adequate minimum nutrition of all household members year‐round is simply taking more, because the percentage of total income being spent on food is lower due to competing needs. It is concluded that poverty‐redressing interventions—as much as they may be in the economic realm only—remain central in the ultimate battle against malnutrition worldwide. The paper also explores how further income elasticity of demand assessments are key to redress the misleading perception that improvements in income alone do not lead to measurable improved nutritional status of vulnerable groups. Ultimately, the paper warns of the dangers of basing mainstream policy to revert malnutrition in the Third World on the conclusions drawn from studies using what the author thinks is misleading data interpretation.

Wage and labor supply effects of illness in Côte d'Ivoire and Ghana: instrumental variable estimates for days disabled

Sickness should make individuals less productive, but there are problems in measuring this effect. First, how is adult morbidity measured in a household survey? Second, how is the impact or morbidity on productivity inferred, if earning is partly used to improve health? Self-reported functional activity limitation due to illness is considered an indicator of morbidity for wage earners and self employed people. To deal with both the measurement and joint determination problems, an instrumental variable estimation approach is used, where local food prices and health services instrument for disability days that reduce wages by at least 10% and hours by 3% or more.

Robustness of an Intermittent Program of Comparative Retail Food Price Information

This study compares the distribution of food-item market basket prices across stores and relative to a local newspaper retail food price report. Distributions of prices for market baskets comprised of national brands and cheapest alternative brands coincided closely with the intermittent retail food price report. This suggests that consumer organizations with limited resources can produce comparative food-store price reports that provide useful information to consumers.

The phenomenon of famine.

Famines are sustained, extreme shortages of food among discrete populations sufficient to cause high rates of mortality. Signs and symptoms of prolonged food deprivation include loss of fat and subcutaneous tissue, depression, apathy, and weakness, which progress to immobility and death of the individual, often from superimposed respiratory or other infections. The social consequences of famines are disruption from mass migrations of people in search of food, breakdown of social behavior, abandonment of cooperative effort, loss of personal pride and sense of family ties, and finally a struggle for individual survival. Famines have been common ever since the development of agriculture made human settlements possible. Food shortages due to crop failures caused by natural disasters including poor weather, insect plagues, and plant diseases; crop destruction due to warfare; and enforced starvation as a political tool are by no means the only causative factors. Many of the worst famines have been due to poor distribution of existing food supplies, either because of inequities that result in a lack of purchasing power on the part of the poor or because of political interference with normal distribution or relief movements of food. Europe and Asia, which in the past experienced frequent severe famines, sometimes with deaths in the hundreds of thousands or millions, have now largely eliminated famines through social and technological change. However, in Africa, political and social factors have destroyed the capacity of many populations to survive drought-induced variations in local food supplies and prices. Thus, famines are due to varying combinations of inadequacy of food supplies for whatever reason and the inability of populations to acquire food because of poverty, civil disturbances, or political interference. Despite the role of natural causes, the conclusion is inescapable that modern famines, like most of those in history, are man-made.