The recently published study ‘Ground truthing the cost of achieving the EAT Lancet recommended diets: Evidence from rural India‘ in Elsevier journal Global Food Security argued that the spend on diet was much less ($0.62-1 or Rs 45 to 73) per person per day than the EAT Lancet recommendations of $3.3 (Rs 241) to get 2,500 kcal per day.
The study was carried out by Soumya Gupta and Prabhu Pingali from Tata Cornell Institute of Agriculture and Nutrition at Cornell University, Vidya Vemireddy from IIM Ahmedabad, and Dhiraj Singh from Institute of Research and Growth.
The researchers argued that rural markets should be tracked to provide an affordable, nutritious diet to the economically weaker section.
They also highlighted the need for crop diversification and increase in awareness.
The researchers pointed at the gap between need and intake primarily for fruits and vegetables, seafood and poultry, red meat and processed food.
The gap is over $1 for each person per day as the current expenditure is about one-third of the required amount.
The data collection for the paper was carried out in 2018-19 in the weekly village markets in Bihar, Odisha and Uttar Pradesh.
Information on diversity and price of nearly 250 items was gathered for 12 months.
The data was compared against EAT Lancet recommendations.
The earlier data from Centre for Monitoring of the Indian Economy (CMIE) also pointed at the cost of diet at about $1.7 (about Rs 127).
AHMEDABAD: The Covid pandemic brought our diet into sharp focus due to its close relationship with immunity. But does our regular ‘staple’ diet provide adequate nutrition? What is the cost when one in every three persons suffer from diet-related malnutrition?
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December 13, 2021