ArticlePublic health nutrition2021
Streamlined data-gathering techniques to estimate the price and affordability of healthy and unhealthy diets under different pricing scenarios.
Article in Public health nutrition, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 14 papers, 2 of them syntheses that pooled it.
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Who cites it
14 citing papers in PubMed, 2 syntheses or guidelines pooled it.
- Assessing the Cost of Healthy and Unhealthy Diets: A Systematic Review of Methods.Current nutrition reports · 2022Pooled it
- Evidence Gaps in Assessments of the Healthiness of Online Supermarkets Highlight the Need for New Monitoring Tools: a Systematic Review.Current atherosclerosis reports · 2022Pooled it
- Diet Cost and Affordability in Queensland: A Two-Year Cross-Sectional Study.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2026Article
- The association between diet price and diet quality among Australian adults participating in the 2020 International Food Policy Study.The British journal of nutrition · 2025Article
- Where Cost of Food Hits Hardest: Investigation of Diet Cost and Affordability in a Low Socioeconomic Region of Australia.Health promotion journal of Australia : official journal of Australian Association of Health Promotion Professionals · 2025Article
- Cost and Affordability of Habitual and Recommended Diets in Welfare-Dependent Households in Australia.Nutrients · 2024Article
- Observational study of population level disparities in food costs in 2021 in Canada: A digital national nutritious food basket (dNNFB).Preventive medicine reports · 2023Article
- Healthy Food Prices Increased More Than the Prices of Unhealthy Options during the COVID-19 Pandemic and Concurrent Challenges to the Food System.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2023Article
- Costing recommended (healthy) and current (unhealthy) diets in urban and inner regional areas of Australia using remote price collection methods.Public health nutrition · 2022Article
- Affordability of Heathy, Equitable and More Sustainable Diets in Low-Income Households in Brisbane before and during the COVID-19 Pandemic.Nutrients · 2021Article
- Cost and Affordability of Healthy, Equitable and Sustainable Diets in Low Socioeconomic Groups in Australia.Nutrients · 2021Article
- Affordability of current, and healthy, more equitable, sustainable diets by area of socioeconomic disadvantage and remoteness in Queensland: insights into food choice.International journal for equity in health · 2021Article
- The Healthiness of Food and Beverages on Price Promotion at Promotional Displays: A Cross-Sectional Audit of Australian Supermarkets.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2020Article
- A tale of two cities: the cost, price-differential and affordability of current and healthy diets in Sydney and Canberra, Australia.The international journal of behavioral nutrition and physical activity · 2020Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
6 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
objectiveTo determine the reliability of streamlined data-gathering techniques for examining the price and affordability of a healthy (recommended) and unhealthy (current) diet. We additionally estimated the price and affordability of diets across socio-economic areas and quantified the influence of different pricing scenarios.
designFollowing the Healthy Diets Australian Standardised Affordability and Pricing (ASAP) protocol, we compared a cross-sectional sample of food and beverage pricing data collected using online data and phone calls (lower-resource streamlined techniques) with data collected in-store from the same retailers.
settingFood and beverage prices were collected from major supermarkets, fast food and alcohol retailers in eight conveniently sampled areas in Victoria, Australia (n 72 stores), stratified by area-level deprivation and remoteness.
participantsThis study did not involve human participants.
resultsThe biweekly price of a healthy diet was on average 21 % cheaper ($596) than an unhealthy diet ($721) for a four-person family using the streamlined techniques, which was comparable with estimates using in-store data (healthy: $594, unhealthy: $731). The diet price differential did not vary considerably across geographical areas (range: 18-23 %). Both diets were estimated to be unaffordable for families living on indicative low disposable household incomes and below the poverty line. The inclusion of generic brands notably reduced the prices of healthy and unhealthy diets (≥20 %), rendering both affordable against indicative low disposable household incomes. Inclusion of discounted prices marginally reduced diet prices (3 %).
conclusionsStreamlined data-gathering techniques are a reliable method for regular, flexible and widespread monitoring of the price and affordability of population diets in areas where supermarkets have an online presence.
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