Decompose food price disparities in China: Evidence from wholesale markets

IF 6.8 1区经济学 Q1 AGRICULTURAL ECONOMICS & POLICY

Food Policy Pub Date : 2025-02-01 DOI:10.1016/j.foodpol.2025.102817

Qingxiao Li , Jinyang Yang , Xiaoli Yang , Endong Mu

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Abstract

This paper examines regional variations in food prices in China and the underlying factors contributing to these disparities. Leveraging administrative data from agricultural wholesale markets, we construct spatial price indices and reveal consistent monthly trends in disparities. Using our proposed decomposition method, we identify livestock products, particularly beef and pork, as the main components driving regional food price differences. We examine the role of local supply–demand factors in explaining spatial food price variations and find that local gasoline prices are a significant contributor to food price disparity. A one percent increase in local gasoline prices leads to a 0.6 percent rise in local food prices and exacerbates spatial food price disparities by 0.5–1.0 percent. These results highlight the importance of considering transportation costs and regional supply–demand dynamics in understanding food price variations across regions. Our findings have implications for policy aiming to address regional food price disparities and ensure food affordability.

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来源期刊

Food Policy 管理科学-农业经济与政策

CiteScore

11.40

自引率

4.60%

发文量

128

审稿时长

62 days

期刊介绍： Food Policy is a multidisciplinary journal publishing original research and novel evidence on issues in the formulation, implementation, and evaluation of policies for the food sector in developing, transition, and advanced economies. Our main focus is on the economic and social aspect of food policy, and we prioritize empirical studies informing international food policy debates. Provided that articles make a clear and explicit contribution to food policy debates of international interest, we consider papers from any of the social sciences. Papers from other disciplines (e.g., law) will be considered only if they provide a key policy contribution, and are written in a style which is accessible to a social science readership.