Socio-economic status, racial composition and the affordability of fresh fruits and vegetables in neighborhoods of a large rural region in Texas
Socio-economic status, racial composition and the affordability of fresh fruits and vegetables in neighborhoods of a large rural region in Texas
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DOI：
10.1186/1475-2891-10-6
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发表时间：
2011-01-18
影响因子：
5.4
通讯作者：
Nayga, Rodolfo M., Jr.
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Dunn, Richard A.;Sharkey, Joseph R.;Nayga, Rodolfo M., Jr.
背景：在农村地区，健康食品的可负担性如何随着社区特征的变化而变化，人们知之甚少。我们研究了德克萨斯州六个农村县新鲜水果和蔬菜的价格如何随着经济和人口特征的变化而变化。方法：使用布拉索斯山谷食品环境项目的实地数据来确定农村地区的所有食品店，以及食品店新鲜水果和蔬菜的可用性和最低价格。社会经济特征是从2000年美国人口普查摘要文件3中提取出来的。我们使用分配策略计算了新鲜水果和新鲜蔬菜的两种价格指数：高品种和基本指数；并使用线性回归模型评估了社区经济和人口特征与新鲜农产品可负担性的关系。结果：在我们的样本商店中，从高品种水果篮子中满足美国农业部水果消费建议的平均成本略高于每周27.50美元。依靠这三种最常见的水果，一周的花费降低到每周17.25美元以下，减少了37.6%。在考虑蔬菜消费时，从高品种转向低品种篮子的影响要小得多：从每周29.23美元下降到27.97美元，降幅为4.3%。单变量回归分析表明，生鲜农产品的价格与当地社区的种族/民族构成无关。然而，多元回归表明，在收入中位数保持不变的情况下，黑人居民比例较高的社区的商店为新鲜水果和蔬菜支付的价格更高。在单变量和多变量分析中，西班牙裔居民的比例与成本都没有关联。结论：这项研究通过检查大片农村地区食品店的新鲜水果和蔬菜的可负担性，以及如何通过社区不平等来获得负担得起的新鲜水果和蔬菜的供应来扩展先前的工作。这项研究的方法和结果对于了解负担得起的健康食品的获取和可获得性具有重要的研究和政策影响。
Background: Little is known about how affordability of healthy food varies with community characteristics in rural settings. We examined how the cost of fresh fruit and vegetables varies with the economic and demographic characteristics in six rural counties of Texas.Methods: Ground-truthed data from the Brazos Valley Food Environment Project were used to identify all food stores in the rural region and the availability and lowest price of fresh whole fruit and vegetables in the food stores. Socioeconomic characteristics were extracted from the 2000 U. S. Census Summary Files 3 at the level of the census block group. We used an imputation strategy to calculate two types of price indices for both fresh fruit and fresh vegetables: a high variety and a basic index; and evaluated the relationship between neighborhood economic and demographic characteristics and affordability of fresh produce, using linear regression models.Results: The mean cost of meeting the USDA recommendation of fruit consumption from a high variety basket of fruit types in our sample of stores was just over $27.50 per week. Relying on the three most common fruits lowered the weekly expense to under $17.25 per week, a reduction of 37.6%. The effect of moving from a high variety to a low variety basket was much less when considering vegetable consumption: a 4.3% decline from $29.23 to $27.97 per week. Univariate regression analysis revealed that the cost of fresh produce is not associated with the racial/ethnic composition of the local community. However, multivariate regression showed that holding median income constant, stores in neighborhoods with higher percentages of Black residents paid more for fresh fruits and vegetables. The proportion of Hispanic residents was not associated with cost in either the univariate or multivariate analysis.Conclusion: This study extends prior work by examining the affordability of fresh fruit and vegetables from food stores in a large rural area; and how access to an affordable supply of fresh fruit and vegetables differs by neighborhood inequalities. The approach and findings of this study are relevant and have important research and policy implications for understanding access and availability of affordable, healthy foods.