Dietary Shift and Diet Quality in India: An Analysis Based on 50th, 61st and 66th Rounds of NSS

Raghav Gaiha1, Nidhi Kaicker, Katsushi Imai, Vani S. Kulkarni and Ganesh Thapa

ASARC Working Papers from The Australian National University, Australia South Asia Research Centre

Abstract: Our study examines changes in diets over the period 1993-2009. Diets have shifted away from cereals towards higher consumption of fruits, vegetables, oils and livestock products. Using household data, a food diversity index (FDI) is constructed, based on five food commodities. Significant price effects that vary over time are confirmed, as also income/expenditure effects. Over and above these effects, more sedentary life styles and less strenuous activity patterns played a significant role in shaping dietary patterns. An important finding is slowing down of dietary transition in the more recent sub-period 2004-09. Clues relate to weakening or strengthening of food price, expenditure and lifestyle effects over time. Using an instrumented measure of FDI in the second stage, and all other exogenous variables, its effects on nutrients' intakes are analysed. A common finding that food diversity is associated with better quality diet and higher intakes of nutrients is not corroborated. While there is a reduction in calorie intake, there are increases in protein and fat intakes. A case is made for provision of public goods, nutrition labelling, regulation of food standards, consumer awareness of healthy diets, food fortification and supplementation, and active involvement of the private sector in adhering to the regulatory standards and nutritional norms.

Pages: 34
Date: 2012
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

Downloads: (external link)
https://crawford.anu.edu.au/acde/asarc/pdf/papers/2012/WP2012_17.pdf (application/pdf)
Our link check indicates that this URL is bad, the error code is: 404 Not Found

Related works:
Chapter: Dietary shift and diet quality in India: an analysis based on the 50th, 61st and 66th rounds of NSS (2014)
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:pas:asarcc:2012-17

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in ASARC Working Papers from The Australian National University, Australia South Asia Research Centre Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Raghbendra Jha ( this e-mail address is bad, please contact ).