The 2020 edition of this report included, for the first time, global estimates of the cost and affordability of a healthy diet. These are useful indicators of people’s economic access to nutritious foods and healthy diets. The effects of inflation in consumer food prices stemming from the economic impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic and the measures put in place to contain it, are clear and significant.
Global consumer food prices were higher by the end of 2020 than they were during any month in the previous six years. This translated directly into an increased average cost of a healthy diet in 2020 for all regions and almost all subregions in the world.