Funded by:

Indicators of Affordability of Nutritious Diets in Africa - Ghana

John NorteyHead, MSU, SRID/MoFA – Ghana

1 Dec, 2016, RomeFAO/WHO Symposium

Vision

• That food prices reflect the nutritious food people need for active and healthy lives

• Food security: All people, at all times, have physical and economic access to sufficient, safe, nutritious food to meet dietary needs and food preference for active and healthy lives. (FAO 1996)

Current food price monitoring in Ghana• Ministry of Food and Agriculture – Statistical

Research and Information Directorate (MoFA-SRID) collects prices of many foods in one or more markets in almost every district in Ghana, at least once per week– Retail, Wholesale, and Farm Gate

• Data reported– District level (weekly and monthly averages)– Regional level (monthly averages)– National level (weekly, monthly, annual)

Current Uses of the Data

• For making quality informed decisions• Planning• Calculating real prices• To compare prices across countries• Research purposes• Food security analysis• Policy formulation, project implementation,

monitoring and evaluation

Need to fill a data gap

• Currently missing: A statistic that covers price of a nutritious diet

• Difficult to formulate informed policies and programs toward food and nutrition security without data showing the problem areas

Indicators of Affordability of Nutritious Diets in Africa (IANDA)– Tufts, University of Ghana, Sokoine University (Tanzania), Johns

Hopkins– Funded by an IMMANA grant

– Problem: Food prices as currently measured do not represent nutritious diets.

– Aim of the project: To show how existing food price data monitoring systems can be used, with very little added cost, to understand the affordability of nutritious diets across seasons and geographies

Piloting an expanded food list

• MoFA-SRID current food list includes 42 foods

• We are piloting an additional 22 foods in order to construct indicators of nutritious diets– Vegetables important in Ghanaian diets

(nkontomire, okro and several others)– Additional fruits (pawpaw, avocado pear,

watermelon)– Fresh fish– Minimally processed versions of raw commodities

(cassava dough, meat and not only live animals)

Piloting an expanded food list

Photos: Anna Herforth

MoFA-SRID enumerator collecting food price data

Proposed indicators

• Cost of a minimally diverse diet• Cost of nutrient adequacy• Cost of a recommended diet

Next steps

• Pilot the addition of missing foods to existing food lists in 9 markets across 7 districts (in progress)

• Work with the IANDA team to assess the results and construct indicators

• Incorporate appropriate missing foods and new indicators into food price monitoring systems at national level

• Continue collaborating with stakeholders to enable use of the data

Significance

• Ghana would be the first country to commit to monitoring the price of nutritious diets

• This can be a model for how food price monitoring can reflect nutritious food, and how this information can inform policy, production, and program decisions to promote healthy diets

Acknowledgements

• The IANDA team: Anna Herforth, Daniel Sarpong, Jennifer Coates, Zachary Gersten, William Masters, Rebecca Heidkamp, Fulgence Mishili, Joyce Kinabo

• MoFA: Harrison Opoku (The Director-SRID), Staff of MSU and Market Data Collectors