Stevier Kaiyatsa

My research project involves assessment of how transport cost affects prices of nutrient-dense foods across the markets in Malawi. Given that not all foods are produced within the locations the markets operate, market traders transport food from areas of high production to areas of low production, which involves transport cost. However, the larger share of marketing cost that market traders incur is transport cost (Fafchamps & Gabre-Madhin, 2006). Increase in transport cost impedes market traders to transport food items from markets in surplus areas to markets in deficit areas. This increases price dispersion across the markets, which increases food prices and reduces food availability in markets located in deficit areas. I’m using monthly consumer price monitoring time series data that the National Statistical Office collects to compute the monthly Consumer Price Index (CPI) to better understand how transport cost affects price dispersion of nutrient-dense foods across the markets. The dataset has monthly retail prices for 27 homogeneous food items that were consistently collected across 29 rural markets from January 2007 to July 2021. I classify the 27 food items into animal source foods, vegetables, fruits, legumes and nuts, and staples including roots and tubers using FAO and FHI 360 (2016) categories of nutrient-dense foods. Animal source foods, vegetables, fruits, and legumes and nuts are nutrient-dense than staples including roots and tubers.