Is the world converging to a ‘Western diet’?

2020 ◽  
pp. 1-9
Author(s):  
Azzeddine Azzam
Keyword(s):  
Nutrition Transition ◽  
Similarity Index ◽  
Weighted Average ◽  
Western Diet ◽  
Balance Sheets ◽  
Income Per Capita ◽  
Western Countries ◽  
Long Run ◽  
Per Capita

Abstract Objective: To test the nutrition transition hypothesis of global dietary convergence to a ‘Western diet’. Design: Consumer-waste-adjusted FAO Food Balance Sheets are used to construct for each country a Western Diet Similarity Index (WSI), expressed as a ratio of calories from animal-sourced foods, oils, fats and sweeteners to total per capita calories. β-Convergence and associated speed are estimated by growth regressions using 1992–2013 panel data. Speed of convergence, a non-linear function of income per capita, globalisation and urbanisation, determines the steady-state or long-term global WSI. The long-term global WSI is compared with the WSI of the group of countries with the highest population-weighted average WSI. The group, determined by K-means cluster analysis, consists of sixteen Western countries. Setting: Worldwide. Participants: Not applicable. Results: Strong evidence of global dietary convergence at a speed driven by income per capita, globalisation and urbanisation with a long-term WSI of 38 %. When compared with the WSI of Western countries (68 %), the hypothesis of global dietary convergence to a Western diet is rejected. Conclusions: The nutrition transition is acting in two opposing directions. Some countries experienced positive and others negative WSI growth, slowing down the transition to a Western diet in the long run. Policies to further slowdown the transition by some countries to unhealthier dietary patterns are as important as policies to further speed up the transition by other countries to healthier ones.

scholarly journals Human Capital Persistence and Development

2017 ◽  
Vol 9 (4) ◽  
pp. 105-136 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rudi Rocha ◽  
Claudio Ferraz ◽  
Rodrigo R. Soares
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Human Capital ◽  
Income Per Capita ◽  
Long Run ◽  
Per Capita ◽  
Late Nineteenth ◽  
Settlement Policy ◽  
And Shifts ◽  
Over Time

This paper documents the persistence of human capital over time and its association with long-term development. We exploit variation induced by a state-sponsored settlement policy that attracted immigrants with higher levels of schooling to particular regions of Brazil in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. We show that one century after the policy, municipalities that received settlements had higher levels of schooling and higher income per capita. We provide evidence that long-run effects worked through higher supply of educational inputs and shifts in the structure of occupations toward skill-intensive sectors. (JEL I26, J22, J24, J61, N36, O15, Z13)

scholarly journals The nutrition transition in Barbados: trends in macronutrient supply from 1961 to 2003

2010 ◽  
Vol 104 (8) ◽  
pp. 1222-1229 ◽  
Author(s):  
T. Sheehy ◽  
S. Sharma
Keyword(s):  
Total Energy ◽  
Nutrition Transition ◽  
Premature Death ◽  
Limit Set ◽  
Dietary Energy ◽  
Analysis Software ◽  
Dietary Analysis ◽  
Balance Sheets ◽  
Upper Limit ◽  
Per Capita

Barbados has been experiencing increasing rates of obesity and chronic non-communicable diseases characteristic of a country in nutrition transition. However, few studies have been carried out on how precisely the diet has changed in recent decades. Our aim was to analyse the FAO food balance sheets for Barbados from 1961 to 2003 in order to characterise the changes that have taken place in the macronutrient supply of the country during that period. Annual food balance sheets were downloaded from the FAOSTAT database, and per capita supply for twelve commodity groupings was analysed for energy and macronutrient levels using WISP dietary analysis software (Tinuviel Software, Llanfechell, Anglesey, UK). The food supply in 2003 provided over 2500 kJ (about 600 kcal) more energy per capita per d than it did in 1961. Energy from carbohydrate as a percentage of total energy has fallen from 70 % in 1961 to 57 % in 2003 and is now at the lower end of WHO recommendations. Energy from fat as a percentage of total energy increased from 19 % to 28 % and now lies at the upper end of WHO recommendations. Sugars, at over 17 % of dietary energy, are well above the upper limit set by the WHO. Despite having methodological limitations associated with the use of food balance statistics, our data suggest that these imbalances need to be addressed as a matter of priority in order to try to reverse the incidence of nutrition-related chronic diseases that are projected to cause increasing disability and premature death in the country in the coming years.

scholarly journals Trade, Institutional Quality and Income: Empirical Evidence for Sub-Saharan Africa

Economies ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
pp. 48
Author(s):  
Huy Quang Doan
Keyword(s):  
Trade Liberalization ◽  
Social Factors ◽  
Institutional Quality ◽  
Real Income ◽  
Short Term ◽  
Income Per Capita ◽  
Per Capita ◽  
Sub Saharan ◽  
Political Globalization

This paper looks at how trade liberalization and institutional quality influence real income. Previous evidence has provided mixed results, and we find that indicators representing trade liberalization have been very weak. By using strongly balanced panel data of 45 Sub-Saharan African countries covering the last 34 years (1980–2013), along with numerous advanced econometric instruments (random effect, fixed effect, system-generalized method of moments, pooled mean group) and composite trade indicators (KOF indicators), this paper determines the impact of trade liberalization, social factors and political globalization on real income per capita in both static and dynamic settings. The paper also considers short-term and long-term effects. The study confirms that free trade has a significant positive impact on the growth of real income per capita in static and dynamic settings. However, it also finds that countries must pay in the short-term to gain more significantly in the long-term. Further, we point out that social factors, especially information flows, can have significant but varying influences on real income under different scenarios and that political globalization both challenges and gives opportunities for improving living standards. We also find that institutional quality is a key factor for economic development in any situation.

A theory of global economic growth in the very long-run: is a grand innovation slowdown inevitable?

2020 ◽  
Vol 6 (53) ◽  
pp. 175-188
Author(s):  
Stanislaw Gomulka
Keyword(s):  
Developed Countries ◽  
World Population ◽  
Extended Model ◽  
Balanced Growth ◽  
Catching Up ◽  
Long Run ◽  
Per Capita ◽  
Global Economic Growth ◽  
Qualitative Changes

AbstractThe paper shows how the original semi endogenous and balanced growth model of Phelps (1966), and my extended version of it (Gomulka, 1990), could be useful in explaining the key ‘stylized facts’ of global long-term growth so far, and in predicting its dynamics in the future. During the last two centuries the sector of R&D and education, producing qualitative changes, has been expanding in the world’s most developed countries much faster than the sector producing conventional goods. The extended model is used to explore and evaluate. the consequences for the global long-term growth of the end of this unbalanced growth, of the completion of the catching up by most of the world’s less developed countries, and of the expected eventual stabilization of the size of the world population. The theory yields a thesis, new in the literature, that the rate of global per capita GDP growth will eventually return to the historically standard very low level, thus implying that the world’s technological revolution is going to be an innovation super-fluctuation.

scholarly journals A Time to Build

2021 ◽  
Vol 21 (35) ◽  
Author(s):  
Ralph Chami ◽  
Elorm Darkey ◽  
Oral Williams
Keyword(s):  
Direct Relationship ◽  
Technical Assistance ◽  
Data Set ◽  
Income Per Capita ◽  
Unique Data ◽  
Tax Revenues ◽  
Long Run ◽  
Time To Build ◽  
Per Capita ◽  
The Impact

We use a unique data set for 115 countries, from 2000–18, and 5-year non-overlapping averages to explore the impact of technical assitance on revenue mobilization. To the authors’ knowledge this is the first such effort to determine a direct relationship between technical assistance and the improvement in tax revenues. The paper finds that technical assistance significantly and positively increases tax revenues. Both income per capita and openness were found to positively improve the tax ratio in line with findings in the literature. Dynamic estimations also uncovered a long-run relationship among technical assistance, income per capita, openness, and tax revenues. This result further underscores that it takes time to build capacity and institutional resilience.

FINANCIAL STATEMENTS IN HEALTH CARE

2018 ◽  
Vol 28 (1) ◽  
pp. 305-308
Author(s):  
Igor Tanturovski
Keyword(s):  
Health Care ◽  
Financial Statements ◽  
Financial Resources ◽  
Public Healthcare ◽  
Health Care Managers ◽  
Balance Sheets ◽  
The Public ◽  
Know How ◽  
Long Run

The consideration of the financial statements, i.e. their preparation, understanding and application in the public healthcare institutions in Macedonia is of paramount importance. The basic data for the financial statements are drawn from the PHI accounting, whereby financial data are provided on the profit and loss accounts, balance sheets and cash flow statements. The financial manager must know how to interpret and use these reports when allocating the financial resources of the institution in order to ensure the achievement of stability in the long run. Finances link economic theory to accounting figures and all health care managers - whether they are in the "production" of health services, sales, research, marketing, management or long-term strategic planning must know what an estimate of the financial performance of the institution

scholarly journals Temporary Protection and Technology Adoption: Evidence from the Napoleonic Blockade

2018 ◽  
Vol 108 (11) ◽  
pp. 3339-3376 ◽  
Author(s):  
Réka Juhász
Keyword(s):  
Economic Development ◽  
Natural Experiment ◽  
Causal Effect ◽  
Value Added ◽  
Napoleonic Wars ◽  
French Empire ◽  
Temporary Protection ◽  
Long Run ◽  
Per Capita

This paper uses a natural experiment to estimate the causal effect of temporary trade protection on long-term economic development. I find that regions in the French Empire which became better protected from trade with the British for exogenous reasons during the Napoleonic Wars (1803–1815) increased capacity in mechanized cotton spinning to a larger extent than regions which remained more exposed to trade. In the long run, regions with exogenously higher spinning capacity had higher activity in mechanized cotton spinning. They also had higher value added per capita in industry up to the second half of the nineteenth century, but not later. (JEL F13, L67, N43, N63, N73)

scholarly journals Is the savings-led growth hypothesis valid for Zimbabwe?

2013 ◽  
Vol 10 (3) ◽  
pp. 9-13
Author(s):  
Kunofiwa Tsaurai
Keyword(s):  
Economic Growth ◽  
Positive Influence ◽  
Sustainable Growth ◽  
Gdp Per Capita ◽  
Case Study Methodology ◽  
Long Run ◽  
Domestic Savings ◽  
Study Methodology ◽  
Per Capita

This study investigates the long run relationship between economic growth and gross domestic savings for Zimbabwe during the period 1980 to 2011. The causality relationship between savings and economic growth has been a subject of extensive debate for almost half a century now. There are currently two dominant views regarding the relationship between savings and economic growth. The first view maintains that it is the growth of savings that drives economic growth. The second view argues that it is economic growth that spurs savings expansion. Using the case study methodology, the study revealed that GDP per capita had a significant positive influence on the quantity and level of gross domestic savings and not the other way round. Policies that are targeted at boosting GDP per capita should be accelerated in order to promote long-term and sustainable growth gross domestic savings for in Zimbabwe

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