Quinoa quandary: Cultural tastes and nutrition in Peru

Andrew Stevens

Food Policy, 2017, vol. 71, issue C, 132-142

Abstract: Using a model of household food demand that incorporates regional preferences (tastes) for culturally appropriate food, I investigate whether tastes for quinoa in the Puno region of Peru reduced household nutrition intakes when quinoa prices dramatically increased between 2004 and 2012. Adapting a model from Atkin (2013) and utilizing data from a national Peruvian household survey (ENAHO), I am able to deconstruct regional changes in household nutrition over time into several general equilibrium effects; in particular, I isolate the effect of regional tastes for quinoa on nutrition outcomes. This effect is identified by an exogenous spike in quinoa prices driven by international demand for quinoa. While I find evidence that regional tastes for quinoa do exist in the Puno region, these tastes do not have a statistically significant impact on nutrition outcomes. My results lend support to the conjecture that tastes for culturally appropriate food do not meaningfully affect household nutrition if the food in question is a sufficiently small component of a household’s overall diet.

Keywords: Quinoa; Nutrition; Price spikes; Culturally appropriate food (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D12 I12 O15 R22 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2017
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (6)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:jfpoli:v:71:y:2017:i:c:p:132-142

DOI: 10.1016/j.foodpol.2017.08.003

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