Rural Household Food Consumption in China: Evidence from the Rural Household Survey

A two-stage budgeting LES-LA/Aids system is used to estimate rural household demand in China with special emphasis on changes in demand for food commodities across different income groups. The data used in this study are from China’s National Rural Household sample survey for 1993. The own-price elasticity for food is more elastic than those for clothing, housing, durable goods, and other items. Within the food group, price elasticities range from-0.18 to-1.24. Wheat and coarse grains are still important staple foods for the average rural household with an expenditure elasticity of almost unity. Meat is the most price elastic among non-staple foods. The education level, the employment structure, and the geographical location significantly effect on food consumption. 1Introduction In recent years, much public attention has been paid to production and its enormous potential for higher efficiencies in China’s farming. A few studies have attempted to analyze detailed impact of changes in households ' consumption patterns resulting from rapidly rising in household income on food demand(e.g. Kueh,1988; Lewis and Andrews, 1989; Huang and Rozelle, 1990; Halbrendt et al., 1994; Fan et al., 1994;