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Healthy Eating for All? The Challenge of Adhering to Dietary Guidelines for Low-Income Groups in China

The Chinese Dietary Guidelines propose a balanced diet for healthy living, but the affordability of this diet needs to be considered, especially for low-income households. To investigate the affordability of a healthy diet, this study analyzes the daily retail prices of 46 food items in 36 Chinese c...

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Autores principales: Yin, Jingjing, Hua, Jingfen, Zhang, Xinhuan, Tuyishimire, Alexandre, Yang, Degang
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2023
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10301239/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/37375608
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/nu15122704
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author Yin, Jingjing
Hua, Jingfen
Zhang, Xinhuan
Tuyishimire, Alexandre
Yang, Degang
author_facet Yin, Jingjing
Hua, Jingfen
Zhang, Xinhuan
Tuyishimire, Alexandre
Yang, Degang
author_sort Yin, Jingjing
collection PubMed
description The Chinese Dietary Guidelines propose a balanced diet for healthy living, but the affordability of this diet needs to be considered, especially for low-income households. To investigate the affordability of a healthy diet, this study analyzes the daily retail prices of 46 food items in 36 Chinese cities from 2016 to 2021. This study compares expenditure, diet composition, and nutritional status in two scenarios aligned with the guidelines. The results show that the mean minimum cost of a balanced diet exceeds the current per capita food expenditure for at least 182.85 million urban households. This suggests that low-income people would need to increase their expenditure by at least 20–121% to achieve the recommended diets. This study also identifies affordable and nutrient-dense foods such as standard flour, eggs, black beans, and cabbage, which policymakers should focus on when monitoring food prices. The findings recommend a combination of social and food system policies to reduce prices and make healthy diets accessible. This study identifies the gaps in the Chinese Dietary Guidelines for ensuring accessibility for vulnerable groups and provides a template for policymakers and researchers to track diet affordability using available food price data in China, contributing to China’s 2030 Health Plan and the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals.
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spelling pubmed-103012392023-06-29 Healthy Eating for All? The Challenge of Adhering to Dietary Guidelines for Low-Income Groups in China Yin, Jingjing Hua, Jingfen Zhang, Xinhuan Tuyishimire, Alexandre Yang, Degang Nutrients Article The Chinese Dietary Guidelines propose a balanced diet for healthy living, but the affordability of this diet needs to be considered, especially for low-income households. To investigate the affordability of a healthy diet, this study analyzes the daily retail prices of 46 food items in 36 Chinese cities from 2016 to 2021. This study compares expenditure, diet composition, and nutritional status in two scenarios aligned with the guidelines. The results show that the mean minimum cost of a balanced diet exceeds the current per capita food expenditure for at least 182.85 million urban households. This suggests that low-income people would need to increase their expenditure by at least 20–121% to achieve the recommended diets. This study also identifies affordable and nutrient-dense foods such as standard flour, eggs, black beans, and cabbage, which policymakers should focus on when monitoring food prices. The findings recommend a combination of social and food system policies to reduce prices and make healthy diets accessible. This study identifies the gaps in the Chinese Dietary Guidelines for ensuring accessibility for vulnerable groups and provides a template for policymakers and researchers to track diet affordability using available food price data in China, contributing to China’s 2030 Health Plan and the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals. MDPI 2023-06-09 /pmc/articles/PMC10301239/ /pubmed/37375608 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/nu15122704 Text en © 2023 by the authors. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
spellingShingle Article
Yin, Jingjing
Hua, Jingfen
Zhang, Xinhuan
Tuyishimire, Alexandre
Yang, Degang
Healthy Eating for All? The Challenge of Adhering to Dietary Guidelines for Low-Income Groups in China
title Healthy Eating for All? The Challenge of Adhering to Dietary Guidelines for Low-Income Groups in China
title_full Healthy Eating for All? The Challenge of Adhering to Dietary Guidelines for Low-Income Groups in China
title_fullStr Healthy Eating for All? The Challenge of Adhering to Dietary Guidelines for Low-Income Groups in China
title_full_unstemmed Healthy Eating for All? The Challenge of Adhering to Dietary Guidelines for Low-Income Groups in China
title_short Healthy Eating for All? The Challenge of Adhering to Dietary Guidelines for Low-Income Groups in China
title_sort healthy eating for all? the challenge of adhering to dietary guidelines for low-income groups in china
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10301239/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/37375608
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/nu15122704
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