  How does food consumption improve educational outcomes is an important policy
issue for developing countries. Applying the Indonesian Family Life Survey
(IFLS) 2014, we estimate the returns of food consumption to education and
investigate if more educated individuals tend to consume healthier bundles than
less-educated individuals do. We implement the Expected Outcome Methodology,
which is similar to Average Treatment on The Treated (ATT) conceptualized by
Angrist and Pischke (2009). We find that education tends to tilt consumption
towards healthier foods. Specifically, individuals with upper secondary or
higher levels of education, on average, consume 31.5% more healthy foods than
those with lower secondary education or lower levels of education. With respect
to unhealthy food consumption, more highly-educated individuals, on average,
consume 22.8% less unhealthy food than less-educated individuals. This suggests
that education can increase the inequality in the consumption of healthy food
bundles. Our study suggests that it is important to design policies to expand
education for all for at least up to higher secondary level in the context of
Indonesia. Our finding also speaks to the link between food-health gradient and
human capital formation for a developing country such as Indonesia.
