Daily costs of a healthy diet in Southeast Asia are highest in Thailand and Brunei and lowest in Singapore and Malaysia, according to the latest UN report on food security and nutrition.
Released in Brazil on Wednesday, the report says disruptions from COVID and the war in Ukraine have fueled ‘significant increases in international food and energy prices.’
For comparisons, the report uses purchasing power parity (PPP) exchange rates. These measure the rate at which a currency of one economy needs to be converted into the currency of another to buy the same amount of goods and services in both economies.
Worldwide, the average daily cost of a healthy diet was 3.96 PPP dollars in 2022, up from 3.56 PPP dollars in 2021 – before the war in Ukraine – and a pre-Covid level of 3.25 PPP dollars in 2019.
ASIA AMONG REGIONS WITH HIGHEST COSTS
By region, the cost of a healthy diet in 2022 was highest in Latin America and the Caribbean (4.56 PPP dollars) followed by Asia (4.20 PPP dollars), Africa (3.74 PPP dollars
), North America and Europe (3.57 PPP dollars), and Oceania (3.46 PPP dollars).
Among ASEAN countries, the cost was highest in Thailand at 4.93 PPP dollars followed by Brunei (4.90 PPP dollars), Laos (4.65 PPP dollars), Indonesia (4.64 PPP dollars) and Myanmar (4.56 PP dollars)
Cambodia had the sixth-highest cost at 4.50 PPP dollars followed by the Philippines (4.10 PPP dollars), Vietnam (3.96 PPP dollars) Malaysia (3.77 PPP dollars) and Singapore (3.48 PPP dollars).
Among other East Asia Summit (EAS) countries, Japan had the highest cost for a healthy diet (6.54 PPP dollars) followed by South Korea (6.09 PPP dollars).
In the other six EAS countries, the cost of maintaining a healthy diet was lower than the Southeast Asia average of 4.35 PPP dollars.
Costs were 3.36 PPP dollars in India and 3.35 PPP dollars in China. The lowest costs were in resource-rich countries – New Zealand (3.21 PPP dollars) followed by Australia and Russia (2.90 PPP dollars) and the United States (2.63 PPP dollars).
The annual re
port – the State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World – is compiled by the Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations (FAO) and four other UN agencies.
DISPARITIES PRONOUNCED IN LOW-INCOME COUNTRIES
In a statement, the FAO said more than 2.8 billion people were unable to afford a healthy diet in 2022.
‘This disparity is most pronounced in low-income countries, where 71.5 percent of the population cannot afford a healthy diet, compared to 6.3 percent in high-income countries.’
‘Notably, the number dropped below pre-pandemic levels in Asia and in Northern America and Europe, while it increased substantially in Africa.’
In launching the report in Rio de Janeiro, FAO Director-General Qu Dongyu welcomed a global decrease in the number of people unable to afford a healthy diet as a ‘positive sign’.
But ‘this is still out of reach for more than one third of people in the world,’ Qu said.
‘The high cost of healthy diets (is) worsening the situation and increasing inequalities. Globally, the
funding gap for this transformation may reach several trillion US Dollars.’
The report defines the cost of a healthy diet as the cost of buying the cheapest locally available foods that meet dietary guidelines for a person within an energy balance of 2,330 kilocalories a day.
According to the UN definition, healthy diets comprise four key elements – food-group diversity, essential nutrient sufficiency, moderate consumption of unhealthy foods, and balanced energy and macronutrient intake.
Source: Agence Kampuchea Presse
