Culturally optimised nutritionally adequate food baskets for dietary guidelines for minimum wage estonian families

Research output: Contribution to journalJournal articlepeer-review

Although low socioeconomic groups have the highest risk of noncommunicable diseases in Estonia, national dietary guidelines and nutrition recommendations do not consider affordability. This study aims to help develop nutritionally adequate, health-promoting, and culturally acceptable dietary guidelines at an affordable price. Three food baskets (FBs) were optimised using linear programming to meet recommended nutrient intakes (RNIs), or Estonian dietary guidelines, or both. In total, 6255 prices of 422 foods were collected. The Estonian National Dietary Survey (ENDS) provided a proxy for cultural acceptability. Food baskets for a family of four, earning minimum wage, contain between 73 and 96 foods and cost between 10.66 and 10.92 EUR per day. The nutritionally adequate FB that does not follow Estonian dietary guidelines deviates the least (26% on average) from ENDS but contains twice the sugar, sweets, and savoury snacks recommended. The health-promoting FB (40% deviation) contains a limited amount of sugar, sweets, and savoury snacks. However, values for vitamin D, iodine, iron, and folate are low compared with RNIs, as is calcium for women of reproductive age. When both the RNIs and dietary guidelines are enforced, the average deviation (73%) and cost (10.92 EUR) are highest. The composition of these FBs can help guide the development of dietary guidelines for low income families in Estonia.

Original languageEnglish
Article number2613
JournalNutrients
Volume12
Issue number9
Number of pages15
ISSN2072-6643
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 2020
Externally publishedYes

Bibliographical note

Publisher Copyright:
© 2020 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland.

    Research areas

  • Affordable diet, Cultural acceptability, Food-based dietary guidelines (FBDG), Linear programming, Low socioeconomic status, Nutritionally adequate diet

ID: 317459547