Healthy Food Prices Increased More Than the Prices of Unhealthy Options during the COVID-19 Pandemic and Concurrent Challenges to the Food System

Meron Lewis (), Lisa-Maree Herron, Mark Chatfield, Ru Chyi Tan, Alana Dale, Stephen Nash and Amanda J. Lee
Additional contact information
Meron Lewis: School of Public Health, Faculty of Medicine, The University of Queensland, Herston 4006, Australia
Lisa-Maree Herron: School of Public Health, Faculty of Medicine, The University of Queensland, Herston 4006, Australia
Ru Chyi Tan: School of Public Health, Faculty of Medicine, The University of Queensland, Herston 4006, Australia
Alana Dale: School of Public Health, Faculty of Medicine, The University of Queensland, Herston 4006, Australia
Stephen Nash: School of Public Health, Faculty of Medicine, The University of Queensland, Herston 4006, Australia
Amanda J. Lee: School of Public Health, Faculty of Medicine, The University of Queensland, Herston 4006, Australia

IJERPH, 2023, vol. 20, issue 4, 1-17

Abstract: Food prices have escalated due to impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on global food systems, and other regional shocks and stressors including climate change and war. Few studies have applied a health lens to identify the most affected foods. This study aimed to assess costs and affordability of habitual (unhealthy) diets and recommended (healthy, equitable and more sustainable) diets and their components in Greater Brisbane, Queensland, Australia from 2019 to 2022 using the Healthy Diets Australian Standardised Affordability and Pricing protocol. Affordability was determined for reference households at three levels of income: median, minimum wage, and welfare-dependent. The recommended diet cost increased 17.9%; mostly in the last year when the prices of healthy foods, such as fruit, vegetables and legumes, healthy fats/oils, grains, and meats/alternatives, increased by 12.8%. In contrast, the cost of the unhealthy foods and drinks in the habitual diet ‘only’ increased 9.0% from 2019 to 2022, and 7.0% from 2021 to 2022. An exception was the cost of unhealthy take-away foods which increased by 14.7% over 2019–2022. With government COVID-19-related payments, for the first time recommended diets were affordable for all and food security and diets improved in 2020. However, the special payments were withdrawn in 2021, and recommended diets became 11.5% less affordable. Permanently increasing welfare support and providing an adequate minimum wage, while keeping basic, healthy foods GST-free and increasing GST to 20% on unhealthy foods, would improve food security and diet-related health inequities. Development of a Consumer Price Index specifically for healthy food would help highlight health risks during economic downturns.

Keywords: diet cost; diet affordability; food security; COVID-19; Australia (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (5)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/20/4/3146/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/20/4/3146/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:20:y:2023:i:4:p:3146-:d:1064679

Access Statistics for this article

IJERPH is currently edited by Ms. Jenna Liu

More articles in IJERPH from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().