Beyond price and income: Preferences and food values in peri-urban Viet Nam

Sub-optimal diets are one of the most important risk factors contributing to the global burden of disease. Developing a better understanding of the drivers of food choice, including the role of individual preferences, is important to address this issue. The objective of this mixed methods research was to identify the relative importance of preferences for different food quality attributes (e.g. nutrition, food safety, price and convenience) that might influence shopping habits and food choice in the context of a rapidly changing peri-urban food environment in Hanoi Province, Viet Nam. A total of 264 women were randomly selected and interviewed using Best-Worst Scaling to elicit preferences among food quality attributes for different food groups (leafy green vegetables, fruits, instant foods, snack foods). A subset of these respondents (n = 40) participated in focus group discussions in order to explore their preferences and food values in more detail. The food quality attributes considered to be most important varied by food group with nutrition and food safety (both immediate and future health) ranking highest for leafy green vegetables and fruits, convenience for instant foods, and taste for snack foods. Price was considered least important across all food groups. Focus group discussions reinforced these results with additional insights particularly regarding trade-offs between nutrition, food safety, convenience, and price. This research demonstrates the feasibility of identifying important drivers of consumption in a South East Asian context using Best-Worst Scaling. These results could help inform the design of behavior change in­ terventions and guide food system policies that seek to shift consumer choices towards healthier diets

Lack of Evidence for Human-to-Human Transmission of Avian Influenza A (H9N2) Viruses in Hong Kong, China 19991

In April 1999, isolation of avian influenza A (H9N2) viruses from humans was confirmed for the first time. H9N2 viruses were isolated from nasopharyngeal aspirate specimens collected from two children who were hospitalized with uncomplicated, febrile, upper respiratory tract illnesses in Hong Kong during March 1999. Novel influenza viruses have the potential to initiate global pandemics if they are sufficiently transmissible among humans. We conducted four retrospective cohort studies of persons exposed to these two H9N2 patients to assess whether human-to-human transmission of avian H9N2 viruses had occurred. No serologic evidence of H9N2 infection was found in family members or health-care workers who had close contact with the H9N2-infected children, suggesting that these H9N2 viruses were not easily transmitted from person to person

Recursion to food plants by free-ranging Bornean elephant

Plant recovery rates after herbivory are thought to be a key factor driving recursion by herbivores to sites and plants to optimise resource-use but have not been investigated as an explanation for recursion in large herbivores. We investigated the relationship between plant recovery and recursion by elephants (Elephas maximus borneensis) in the Lower Kinabatangan Wildlife Sanctuary, Sabah. We identified 182 recently eaten food plants, from 30 species, along 14 × 50 m transects and measured their recovery growth each month over nine months or until they were re-browsed by elephants. The monthly growth in leaf and branch or shoot length for each plant was used to calculate the time required (months) for each species to recover to its pre-eaten length. Elephant returned to all but two transects with 10 eaten plants, a further 26 plants died leaving 146 plants that could be re-eaten. Recursion occurred to 58% of all plants and 12 of the 30 species. Seventy-seven percent of the re-eaten plants were grasses. Recovery times to all plants varied from two to twenty months depending on the species. Recursion to all grasses coincided with plant recovery whereas recursion to most browsed plants occurred four to twelve months before they had recovered to their previous length. The small sample size of many browsed plants that received recursion and uneven plant species distribution across transects limits our ability to generalise for most browsed species but a prominent pattern in plant-scale recursion did emerge. Plant recovery time was a good predictor of time to recursion but varied as a function of growth form (grass, ginger, palm, liana and woody) and differences between sites. Time to plant recursion coincided with plant recovery time for the elephant’s preferred food, grasses, and perhaps also gingers, but not the other browsed species. Elephants are bulk feeders so it is likely that they time their returns to bulk feed on these grass species when quantities have recovered sufficiently to meet their intake requirements. The implications for habitat and elephant management are discussed

Along the River Soumsoum: Urban Agriculture in Ngaoundéré

With increasing urbanization large amounts of poverty is shifting from rural to urban centres, posing problems of unemployment and access to food. Due to this dynamic, urban poor all over the world have begun cultivating food in open areas in cities as a means of survival and in an attempt of securing food. With this in mind, this paper seeks to establish the place that urban agriculture holds in the small but rapidly expanding city of Ngaoundéré, in the Adamaoua Province of Cameroon. This is done through exploring the form, function and benefits of urban agriculture for those that partake in it on a daily basis. This paper also ad-dresses the largest problems faced and the associated risks of urban agriculture compounded by an unsupportive system, as well as considerations for ameliorating the present situation of urban agriculture in Ngaoundéré. Currently, urban agriculture in Ngaoundéré poses a poten-tial public health risk if problems faced by farmers remain unaddressed. But if the urban agri-culture system is enabled it has the potential of creating work, food security and nutrition to the urban poor of Ngaoundéré

Stabilizing price incentives for staple grain producers in the context of broader agricultural policies: debates and country experiences

Price uncertainty is a major constraint to a sustained increase in staple food production. This paper reviews the trends and patterns of addressing this age-old problem over the course of the past several decades. Farmers in most developed countries and many Asian and Latin American countries have relied on a variety of public support programs as well as market-based marketing and price-risk management instruments to boost grain production. By contrast, inadequate support programs and weak market-based production services have led to stagnating production and increasing dependence on food imports in many poor African countries. State-led stabilization efforts that utilize and support private sector operations, complement market-based risk management instruments and address coordination failure and missing markets provide a better incentive to increase grain production. A more coordinated market stabilization effort is required in the future as a number of long-term structural factors such as climate change, water scarcity, high oil prices, soil degradation, biofuel production, and speculation in financial markets, point to a scenario of more volatile grain prices

Global dietary convergence from 1970 to 2010 altered inequality in agriculture, nutrition and health

PRIFPRI3; CRP4; HarvestPlus; 2 Promoting Healthy Diets and Nutrition for all; 4 Transforming Agricultural and Rural EconomiesHarvestPlus; A4NHCGIAR Research Program on Agriculture for Nutrition and Health (A4NH

Global inequality in national food supplies and diet-related health outcomes, 1970–2010 (P04-094-19)

The global food system has changed rapidly over recent decades, with large shifts in agricultural supply conditions, international trade, food manufacturing and nutrient availability. These shifts have contributed to both positive and negative impacts on health and wellbeing with some countries catching up while others have fallen further below international norms. We aim to quantify long-run changes in the food supply and diet-related health disparities across countries, to illustrate how inequality has changed from the 1970 s to the 2010 s.Non-PRIFPRI5; CRP4; 2 Promoting Healthy Diets and Nutrition for all; UNFSSHarvestPlus; A4NHCGIAR Research Programs on Agriculture for Nutrition and Health (A4NH

Overcoming Dietary Assessment Challenges in Low-Income Countries: Technological Solutions Proposed by the International Dietary Data Expansion (INDDEX) Project

An increasing number of low-income countries (LICs) exhibit high rates of malnutrition coincident with rising rates of overweight and obesity. Individual-level dietary data are needed to inform effective responses, yet dietary data from large-scale surveys conducted in LICs remain extremely limited. This discussion paper first seeks to highlight the barriers to collection and use of individual-level dietary data in LICs. Second, it introduces readers to new technological developments and research initiatives to remedy this situation, led by the International Dietary Data Expansion (INDDEX) Project. Constraints to conducting large-scale dietary assessments include significant costs, time burden, technical complexity, and limited investment in dietary research infrastructure, including the necessary tools and databases required to collect individual-level dietary data in large surveys. To address existing bottlenecks, the INDDEX Project is developing a dietary assessment platform for LICs, called INDDEX24, consisting of a mobile application integrated with a web database application, which is expected to facilitate seamless data collection and processing. These tools will be subject to rigorous testing including feasibility, validation, and cost studies. To scale up dietary data collection and use in LICs, the INDDEX Project will also invest in food composition databases, an individual-level dietary data dissemination platform, and capacity development activities. Although the INDDEX Project activities are expected to improve the ability of researchers and policymakers in low-income countries to collect, process, and use dietary data, the global nutrition community is urged to commit further significant investments in order to adequately address the range and scope of challenges described in this paper