Food prices and food consumption: potential contradictions between health and economic policy

Transcription

1 Food prices and food consumption: potential contradictions between health and economic policy Dr Laura Cornelsen Dr Rosemary Green Dr Alan Dangour Prof Richard Smith BNF

2 Fiscal policies Price is an important determinant of food purchase decisions Relative importance of price depends on income level Taxing unhealthy foods and/or subsidising healthy foods is one potential opportunity to change purchase behaviour We can estimate quite well how the consumption of taxed/subsidised product would change using own-price elasticities

3 Own-price elasticities of food FoodGroup Low income (n=1,412) *Predictions based on multiple regression with random effects elasticities Middle income (n=827) High income (n=1,124) Fruit and vegetable Meat Fish Dairy Cereals Fats and oils Sweets, confectioneryand sweetened beverages Green R et al. The effect of rising food prices on food consumption: systematic review with meta-regression. BMJ 2013; 346:f3703 doi: /bmj.f370

4 Within countries Food Group Lowest income (n=178) Highest income (n=177) Fruit and vegetable Meat Fish Dairy Cereals Sweets, confectioneryand sweetened beverages Green R et al. The effect of rising food prices on food consumption: systematic review with meta-regression. BMJ 2013; 346:f3703 doi: /bmj.f370

5 Other changes in food consumption? Cross price effects Substitution carbonated drink for juice Complement breakfast cereal and milk Income effects less of meat, fish, cheese etc. Why do we know less? Data intensive (trade off between detail of food and coverage of whole diet) Variability within populations Small effects difficult to estimate

6 Cross-price elasticities in highincome countries Fruit&Veg Meat Fish Dairy Cereals Fat&oil Sweets Fruit&veg -0.53** ** ** 0.072** ** 0.043* Meat ** * 0.061* Fish ** ** Dairy ** ** -0.60** 0.105** Cereals ** ** Fat&oil ** Sweets * ** n Predictions based on a multiple regression model elasticities. ** statistically significant at 5% level, *10% Do not cite; under review for publication.

7 UK context: Consumption data and food composition tables from National Diet and Nutrition Survey ( ) DEFRA elasticity estimates for 2009 (Tiffin et al. 2011) Scenario of price increase of 10% of Sugary foods (biscuits, buns and cakes, chocolate and sweets, sugar and sweet spreads, puddings and pies) Non-alcoholic drinks (excluding milk and fruit juice) Fats and fatty foods (butter, margarine, low fat spread, cooking oil, crisps and savoury snacks)

8 Priceincreases of 10% of Sugary foods Non-alcoholic drinks (including diet drinks) Fats and fatty foods Consumption falls* 4g 13 kcal 16 g 3 kcal 1 g 6 kcal *Average of men and women, per day Source: data from DEFRA 2011, NDNS Consume less Meats, fish, dairy, starches, potatoes, fruit, nonalcoholic drink, fruitjuice 4g / 5 kcal Meats, fish, dairy, starches, potatoes, fruit, fruitjuice, sweets 2g / 4 kcal Meats, fish, dairy, starches, potatoes, fruit, fruitjuice 2g / 3 kcal Consume more Fresh veg,fats, alcoholic drinks 1g / 1 kcal Fresh veg,fats, alcoholic drinks 1g / 2 kcal Fresh veg,sweets, non-alcoholic drinks, alcoholic drinks 1g / 1 kcal

9 Fiscal policy the unknown effects Cross-price effects across the diet Shift to cheaper versions of the same foods or same foods at cheaper prices (lowcost supermarkets) Financial incentive to switch to own-brands (e.g. in an online supermarket Coca-Cola cost 1.98 per 2l ; equivalent 2l own-brand Cola cost 0.57) Will industry pass on the tax (depends if demand is elastic or inelastic)? Re-formulation of products (could go either way) Coca Cola in Mexico to use HFCS (potential move due to tax) Sprite in UK has 30% Stevia(tax unrelated) Cornelsenet al. Why fat taxes won t make us thin Journal of Public Health (in press).

10 Taxes vs subsidies Subsidies for healthy foods suggested to counter balance taxes Do people react to subsidies and taxes symmetrically? What are the cross-price effects for subsidies? Emotional reaction to tax/subsidy vsmarket based price change? New, MRC funded, research will be looking at this in the next couple of years using both routinely collected data and running discrete choice experiments.