Foods: Healthy Foods are Expensive (cont.)
You Get What You Pay For
At a recent symposium on the science of obesity, presented at the Harvard School of Public Health in Boston, Drenowski argued that many Americans are obese not by choice, but because they can't afford the luxury of being thin. The economics of food production, he says, are balanced heavily in favor of cheap foods that pack a big caloric wallop.
"Refined grain, added sugars, and added fats remain the cheapest elements of our diet," Drenowski says. "Just how cheap is something not many people appreciate. At global market rates, sugar -- refined sugar, sucrose -- costs nine cents per pound. In other words, sugar provides you with 20,000 calories for one dollar. If you look at fat at world market prices, you will be getting one pound of fat for 20 cents, which means another 20,000 calories for one dollar."
Fats, refined grains, and sugars are among the foods highest in what nutritionists call "energy density," which means that they contribute more calories pound-for-pound to the diet than, say, lean fish, vegetables, or fruits. But many foods with low energy density are full of nutrients, such as whole grains and vegetables.
"Basically, the two variables are fat and water. If things are higher in fat, they're higher energy density generally, and fat is relatively cheap. Using corn oil, or soybean oil, or safflower oil is relatively inexpensive. The cuts of meat on an animal that are high in fat are the least desirable generally," explains Victoria H. Castellanos, PhD, RD, founding Director of the Long Term Care Institute at the National Policy and Resource Center on Nutrition and Aging at Florida International University in Miami, in an interview with WebMD.
Small portions of high energy density foods such as chocolate chip cookies will have the same calorie content as a much larger serving of strawberries, and the cookies will leave you wanting more. Fruits and vegetables, on the other hand, are high in water content and in fiber, both of which are filling, meaning that you can eat a much larger portion of strawberries and still satisfy your hunger.
The catch is that the foods nutrition experts consider to be "healthy" in addition to fruits and vegetables -- lean meats, nuts, and whole grains -- are out of the financial reach of many Americans.
"It's very difficult to argue on the basis of health and variety for consumers to make different food choices, because food choices, like everything else, are determined by economics," Drenowski says.
"Bread, potatoes, rice, and pasta are relatively inexpensive; it's pretty cheap to grow a grain or a potato," says Castellanos. "It's much more expensive to grow a vegetable and get it to market in good shape. If you're growing broccoli, it takes good soil, it takes a lot of water, you have to have refrigerate it and it can spoil so you have wastage. So produce is a lot more expensive than a grain or an oil."