Food Policy最新文献

英文中文

The effect of food price upsurges on income inequality: The richest win and the poorest lose

IF 6.8 1区经济学 Q1 AGRICULTURAL ECONOMICS & POLICY

Food Policy

Pub Date : 2025-02-01 DOI: 10.1016/j.foodpol.2025.102830

Marta Marson , Donatella Saccone

From a theoretical perspective, the ultimate effect that food price shocks may have on inequality is ambiguous. Food price shocks, indeed, generate both winners and losers and their overall impact on income distribution cannot be predicted a priori but depends on the relative magnitude of different effects. From the empirical perspective, however, the link between international food prices and income distribution is largely understudied. The present paper tries to fill the gap by analyzing a large sample of 126 developing and developed countries observed in the period 1990–2020 and studying how food price shocks are associated with changes in income distribution. The heterogeneity of the effect is investigated by means of interaction terms accounting for the food trade balance of countries and the structure of the agricultural sector, coming to three main conclusions. First, upsurging food prices increase inequality by affecting the relative income of the poorest 50 percent of the population to the advantage of richer people, especially of the richest among the rich. Second, this effect is relevant for developing countries while no clear findings emerge for high-income countries. Third, the disequalizing effect of soaring international food prices is not uniform in developing countries but largely depends on their food trade balance and some structural attributes of their agricultural sector. In this regard, food policy must reduce the domestic transmission of price shocks to poor consumers while strengthening farmers’ productive capacity and ability to cope with the shocks through better access to land, capital and productive resources.

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引用次数: 0

Much ado about nothing? An empirical analysis of consumer behaviour in the presence of ‘dual food quality’

IF 6.8 1区经济学 Q1 AGRICULTURAL ECONOMICS & POLICY

Food Policy

Pub Date : 2025-02-01 DOI: 10.1016/j.foodpol.2025.102803

Di Marcantonio Federica , Jesus Barreiro-Hurle , Luisa Menapace , Colen Liesbeth , Dessart François J. , Ciaian Pavel

Marketing food products with slightly different compositions as identical across countries is a common practice in the food industry. While food companies argue that different versions reflect taste preferences, some Central and Eastern European consumers allege that multinational companies sell lower quality products using the same brand name and packaging as in Western European countries. The political attention gathered by this practice, exemplified by the dual food quality (DFQ) debate in the European Union (EU), has largely neglected how the presence of DFQ affects consumers’ purchase decisions. This study aims to help fill this gap. Additionally, it examines the impact of a policy intervention consisting of a ‘made for’ claim and the role of the brand name on consumer choices. Through online discrete-choice experiments and laboratory tasting and rating experiments in six EU countries, no systematic support is found for either the industry’s or the consumers’ arguments. Results also indicate that a policy requiring consumers to be informed about the destination market of different versions would increase consumers’ valuation of domestic products, while at the same time improving transparency and avoiding misleading consumers.

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引用次数: 0

How helpful are the “hidden costs of food systems” numbers?

IF 6.8 1区经济学 Q1 AGRICULTURAL ECONOMICS & POLICY

Food Policy

Pub Date : 2025-02-01 DOI: 10.1016/j.foodpol.2024.102796

Jonathan Brooks , Eugenio Diaz-Bonilla

The “hidden costs of foods systems” calculations reported by the Food and Land Use Coalition, the Food System Economic Commission and the UN Food and Agriculture Organization may not provide helpful policy guidance for the transformation of food systems for both economic and political reasons. Economically, the hidden costs numbers exclude countervailing social benefits which imply unavoidable trade-offs across policy objectives. They also aggregate costs that are fundamentally different in their economic character and require different policy approaches, while including some costs that are not attributable to food systems at all. Politically, the headline numbers risk impeding transformative change because they identify food systems participants – particularly farmers –in terms of the damage they inflict while ignoring critical benefits they confer, and implicate them in social failings for which they are not primarily responsible. However, the hidden costs numbers can be useful if integrated into a more balanced assessment of the performance of food systems. Such an approach could support a positive agenda which engages the actors whose contributions will be indispensable.

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引用次数: 0

Urban food policy councils as politicized spaces: The case of Arusha, Tanzania

IF 6.8 1区经济学 Q1 AGRICULTURAL ECONOMICS & POLICY

Food Policy

Pub Date : 2025-02-01 DOI: 10.1016/j.foodpol.2025.102802

Amber Steyaert , Thomas Kuyper , Joost Dessein , Charlotte Prové

Informal food vendors constitute a significant portion of the workforce in Arusha, Tanzania, and play a crucial role in the local food system. Despite their importance, these vendors lack political and social agency, resulting in their underrepresentation in decision-making processes. This study explores the potential of urban food policy councils (UFPCs) to support these vendors, focusing on the Arusha Sustainable Food System Platform. Recently, the platform faced a government directive to relocate street vendors without their participation. This case study examines the platform’s response to this directive.

Using a conceptual framework that positions UFPCs as politicized spaces, centered on social justice, epistemic justice, and empowerment, and an analytical framework based on critical governance, this research employs document analysis, in-depth interviews, focus groups with market vendors, and participative observations of platform meetings and events.

The findings reveal that the ASFSP refrained from engaging with vendors due to several factors: a focus on food safety concerns overshadowing social justice concerns, a preference for formality that excludes informal actors, and limitations imposed by the city council, with relocation decisions made at the national level beyond the platform’s influence. Nevertheless, the platform shows significant promise in addressing democratic deficits in Arusha’s local food systems, but further steps are necessary for it to function effectively as a politicized space. Its transformative potential is contingent upon being embedded within a broader democratic context.

The framework of UFPCs as politicized spaces offers a possibility to connect the food democracy debate and UFPC literature. Additionally, the study offers practical insights for the platform and similar councils to improve the inclusion of street vendors in decision-making processes.

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引用次数: 0

Can differentiated value-added tax rates promote healthier diets? The case of Costa Rica

IF 6.8 1区经济学 Q1 AGRICULTURAL ECONOMICS & POLICY

Food Policy

Pub Date : 2025-02-01 DOI: 10.1016/j.foodpol.2025.102824

Maxime Roche

In February 2023, Costa Rica reformed its basic value-added tax basket on which a reduced rate applies to “guarantee a balanced diet”. This paper assesses ex-ante the impact of the reform on nutrient availability and household spending across income groups. Price elasticities are estimated using pooled National Household Income and Expenditure Survey data and a two-step censored quadratic almost ideal demand system model accounting for price and total expenditure endogeneity. Nutritional information is derived from food composition tables. Food items are grouped by processing level as a proxy to explore differences in own- and cross-price effects between ‘healthier’ and ‘less healthy’ items. The demand for ultra-processed sweet and savoury foods is price-inelastic (−0.74 and −0.81, respectively). Lower-income households’ demand is more price-sensitive. The reform applies a reduced rate to a significant number of ultra-processed savoury food items and is associated with an increase in household purchases of calories (0.7%), sugar (0.4%), and saturated fat (1.2%). A counterfactual scenario with a basic tax basket defined based on the Pan American Health Organization nutrient profile model criteria is associated with the largest reductions in calories (−0.2%), sodium (−1.0%), and saturated fat (−0.6%), with higher benefits for lower-income households. It results in minor decreases in household spending (−0.2%). While an increasing number of countries contemplate the taxation of foods high in fat, salt, or sugar, Costa Rica is unique in mandating the consideration of nutritional aspects in determining value-added tax rates. However, the recently adopted basic tax basket may not fulfil this potential.

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引用次数: 0

Decompose food price disparities in China: Evidence from wholesale markets

IF 6.8 1区经济学 Q1 AGRICULTURAL ECONOMICS & POLICY

Food Policy

Pub Date : 2025-02-01 DOI: 10.1016/j.foodpol.2025.102817

Qingxiao Li , Jinyang Yang , Xiaoli Yang , Endong Mu

This paper examines regional variations in food prices in China and the underlying factors contributing to these disparities. Leveraging administrative data from agricultural wholesale markets, we construct spatial price indices and reveal consistent monthly trends in disparities. Using our proposed decomposition method, we identify livestock products, particularly beef and pork, as the main components driving regional food price differences. We examine the role of local supply–demand factors in explaining spatial food price variations and find that local gasoline prices are a significant contributor to food price disparity. A one percent increase in local gasoline prices leads to a 0.6 percent rise in local food prices and exacerbates spatial food price disparities by 0.5–1.0 percent. These results highlight the importance of considering transportation costs and regional supply–demand dynamics in understanding food price variations across regions. Our findings have implications for policy aiming to address regional food price disparities and ensure food affordability.

引用次数: 0

Machine learning on national shopping data reliably estimates childhood obesity prevalence and socio-economic deprivation

IF 6.8 1区经济学 Q1 AGRICULTURAL ECONOMICS & POLICY

Food Policy

Pub Date : 2025-02-01 DOI: 10.1016/j.foodpol.2025.102826

Gavin Long , Georgiana Nica-Avram , John Harvey , Evgeniya Lukinova , Roberto Mansilla , Simon Welham , Gregor Engelmann , Elizabeth Dolan , Kuzivakwashe Makokoro , Michelle Thomas , Edward Powell , James Goulding

Deprivation pushes people to choose cheap, calorie-dense foods instead of nutritious but expensive alternatives. Diseases, such as obesity, cardiovascular disease, and diabetes, resulting from these poor dietary choices place a significant burden on public health systems. Measuring nutritional insecurity is difficult to achieve at scale and so the ability to study the relationship between nutritional outcomes and deprivation at a national level is very challenging. This makes it difficult to understand the effect of new policies or track changes over time. To address this challenge, we develop a machine learning approach using massive anonymised transactional data (4 million members and 2.5 billion transactions) in partnership with the retailer The Co-operative Group UK. We engineer a series of variables related to obesogenic diets, including a new measure called ‘Calorie-oriented purchasing’. These variables help illustrate how large-scale transactional data can discriminate between neighbourhoods most affected by deprivation and childhood obesity. Through comparative assessment of machine learning approaches, we find better performance from tree-based models (Random Forest, XGBoost) with the best-achieving accuracy of 0.88 for predicting deprivation and an accuracy of 0.79 for childhood obesity. Calorie-oriented purchasing emerges as a robust predictor of deprivation and childhood obesity at the census area level. Results show this approach can help summarise nutritional insecurity, and support its spatio-temporal monitoring. We conclude with policy implications and recommend retailers adopt new measures for measuring national nutrition insecurity.

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引用次数: 0

Maize yield responsiveness and profitability of fertilizer: New survey evidence from six African countries

IF 6.8 1区经济学 Q1 AGRICULTURAL ECONOMICS & POLICY

Food Policy

Pub Date : 2025-01-31 DOI: 10.1016/j.foodpol.2025.102815

Catherine Ragasa , Hiroyuki Takeshima , Seth Asante , Mulubrhan Amare , Ning Ma , Opeyemi Olanrewaju , Jan Duchoslav

Enhancing maize productivity growth is pivotal for revolutionizing the agrifood system in Africa, with inorganic fertilizer serving as a fundamental input for catalyzing this progress. However, concerns are mounting about the low and decreasing yield response and profitability of inorganic fertilizer use, particularly in Sub-Saharan Africa. This study aims to refine yield response and profitability models by incorporating recent data from nationally representative and panel datasets spanning six countries. Most countries exhibited low nitrogen yield responsiveness (4–7 kg), while Ghana and Uganda showed higher responsiveness (15–20 kg) per additional 1 kg of nitrogen. Analysis of fertilizer-to-maize price ratios from 2010 to 2023 showed a downward trend, with spikes in 2022 in Ghana, Malawi, Nigeria, and Tanzania. Overall, except for those years, the data suggest a trend of increasingly favorable price incentives for fertilizer use. Ethiopia, Tanzania, and Uganda experienced declines in the fertilizer-to-maize price ratio. Increasing inorganic fertilizer use would be profitable in Ethiopia, Ghana, Nigeria, and Uganda at current market prices, but not in Malawi or Tanzania. Subsidies in Malawi and Tanzania have boosted profitability, but these may not be necessary in Ghana, Nigeria, or Uganda, which already have favorable price incentives; Malawi could benefit by substantially reducing its 80 percent subsidy while maintaining decent price incentives and farm profits. The paper proposes policy options based on factors influencing yield responsiveness and potential improvements drawn from new modeling and synthesis of the literature.

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引用次数: 0

Contribution of community seed banks to farmer seed systems and food security in Northern and Central Malawi

IF 6.8 1区经济学 Q1 AGRICULTURAL ECONOMICS & POLICY

Food Policy

Pub Date : 2025-01-04 DOI: 10.1016/j.foodpol.2024.102792

Grace Tione , Ola Tveitereid Westengen , Stein Terje Holden , Samson P. Katengeza , Clifton Makate

Community Seed Banks (CSBs) are promoted as an approach to support farmers’ access to quality seeds of adapted varieties. While the adoption and impact of varieties distributed through conventional formal seed systems have been extensively studied, research on how participation in CSBs relates to farmers’ seed systems and food security is limited. This paper uses survey data covering 688 households and 1600 plots from Northern and Central Malawi, combined with historical climate data, to assess the extent to which farmers are utilizing CSBs as a seed source and the association of farmer participation in CSBs with a range of other foods system variables. We find that CSBs are the source of about 1/3 of the seeds of maize, groundnut, and soyabean used by the participants and that they source less of their seeds from their own harvest compared to non-participants. While the use of CSB seeds of different crops shows mixed associations with yields at the plot-level, we find that CSB participation is positively associated with higher household food security overall. Furthermore, we find a positive association between exposure to high mean temperatures and rainfall shortages and the propensity to participate in CSBs, suggesting CSBs play a role in adaptation. This study thus shows that CSB participation is associated with several positive food system outcomes, but more research is needed to understand the causal links as well as the efficiency of CSBs compared to other approaches to strengthen farmers’ seed security.

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引用次数: 0

Early growing season temperature variation and fertilizer use among smallholder farmers

IF 6.8 1区经济学 Q1 AGRICULTURAL ECONOMICS & POLICY

Food Policy

Pub Date : 2025-01-04 DOI: 10.1016/j.foodpol.2024.102793

Musa Hasen Ahmed

This study examines the impact of early growing season temperature variation on fertilizer use among maize-producing smallholder farmers in Ethiopia. A unique, decade-long dataset collected at the plot level was integrated with climate data to construct weather variation indicators that are comparable across time and space. The findings reveal that smallholder farmers adapt their fertilizer application strategies in response to early growing season temperature variations. Heterogeneity analyses show that environmental factors such as altitude affect fertilizer use when farmers face early growing season temperature variations.

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全部化学•材料生命科学医学物理工程技术环境•农林材料科学地球科学法学管理学化学环境科学与生态学计算机科学教育学经济学农林科学人文科学生物学数学物理与天体物理心理学综合性期刊其他工业工程理学历史学农学文学信息工程

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Food Policy

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