Abstract:
In present study variation in expenditure, quantity of food consumed and calories intake/ adult is observed. A rapid increase in average value of food purchased from lowest income group to highest group was observed and varies from 7523.5 Rs/month to 35,880 Rs/month. Using ANOVA, Hypothesis of equality of average food expenditure among income strata was found statistically highly significant. Proportion of food expenditure varies from 0.99 to 0.35 from lowest to highest income group. On the basis of ranges of true proportion of food expenditures, possible variability in proportion was observed statistically at certain level of confidence. Pair wise statistical comparison of true proportion of food expenditures of income groups were also made and it suggested reduction in number of income groups into four groups by merging last three into one group. Income Elasticity ( IE ) of last three income groups are less than 0.50 which indicated savings for high income families while low income families have much less savings because IE is more the 0.50. Correlation between income (X) and food expenditures (Y) for all income groups were found positive and highly significant varying from 0.54 to 0.94. Both IE and correlation indicates as income increases, food expenditure also increases. Moreover it was observed that as family income increases the percentage expenditure on vegetable origin decreases from 60% to 46% and increases from 39.62% to 53.78% for animal origin. Calories intake/adult/day increases as the income increases and varies from 1571 to 1805 in case of vegetable origin and 100 to 839 for animal origin. Calories intake/adult/day was computed for all income groups and compared with world standards and concluded that calories intake by high income group only approximately meets the FAO standard.
Page(s):
317-321
DOI:
DOI not available
Published:
Journal: Science International, Volume: 24, Issue: 3, Year: 2012