Food expenses down in both rural, urban households since 1972-73

New Delhi, Dec 30 (UNI) The share of food expenditure has seen a sustained fall in household expenses throughout the three decades since 1972-73 -- from 73 per cent to 55 per cent in rural areas and from 64 per cent to 42 per cent in urban areas.

In urban India, there has been a drop in the shares of other food groups besides cereals and pulses, including milk and milk products, edible oil and sugar, according to the latest National Sample Survey Organisation (NSSO) survey for 2004-05.

Conversely, the share of milk and milk products, eggs, fish and meat, and fruit and nuts rose by about 1 percentage point each in the rural areas with the share of vegetables going up by 2.5 percentage points, the survey found.

Beverages, refreshments and processed food too was up by 2 percentage points since 1972-73. Only the share of sugar and pulses dropped -- the latter mainly during the past decade -- noticeably along with cereals.

These were the findings of the latest report on "Level and Pattern of Consumer Expenditure, 2004-05" carried out by the NSSO in the Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation.

The quantity of cereals consumed monthly per head fell between 1993-94 and 2004-05, that is in the decade preceding the survey from 13.4 kg to 12.1 kg in rural India and from 10.6 kg to 9.9 kg in urban areas.

The average value of cereals consumed monthly per head was Rs 101 in rural areas and Rs 106 in urban areas.

Even in consumption of cereals wide disparities showed up among the states. In rural areas of Haryana and Punjab, expenditure on cereals formed only 9 per cent of total consumer expenditure. But in rural areas of West Bengal and Asom, cereals constituted 23 per cent or above of the total consumer expenditure, going up to 27 to 28 per cent in rural Orissa, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand and Bihar.

Cereals took up 6-7 per cent of total consumer spends in urban Punjab and Haryana in contrast to 17 per cent in urban Bihar and Orissa.

The report, which is first in a series of seven reports to be brought out on the basis of the survey, presents the size and distributions of households and persons over different ranges of Monthly Per Capita Expenditure (or different "MPCE" classes).

The survey, which covered all states and union territories, was spread over 7,999 villages and 4,602 urban blocks covering 79,298 rural and 45,346 urban households respectively.

UNI SD CS HS1459