Informal food environment is associated with household vegetable purchase patterns and dietary intake in the DECIDE study: Empirical evidence from food vendor mapping in peri-urban Dar es Salaam, Tanzania

Ramya Ambikapathi; Gerald Shively; Germana Leyna; Dominic Mosha; Ally Mangara; Crystal L Patil; Morgan Boncyk; Savannah L Froese; Cristiana K Verissimo; Patrick Kazonda; Mary Mwanyika-Sando; Japhet Killewo; Nilupa S Gunaratna

doi:10.1016/j.gfs.2020.100474

Informal food environment is associated with household vegetable purchase patterns and dietary intake in the DECIDE study: Empirical evidence from food vendor mapping in peri-urban Dar es Salaam, Tanzania

Glob Food Sec. 2021 Mar:28:100474. doi: 10.1016/j.gfs.2020.100474.

Authors

Affiliations

¹ Department of Public Health, Purdue University, USA.
² Department of Agricultural Economics & International Programs in Agriculture, Purdue University, USA.
³ Tanzania Food and Nutrition Centre, Tanzania.
⁴ African Academy of Public Health, Tanzania.
⁵ Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, Muhimbili University of Health and Allied Sciences, Tanzania.
⁶ Department of Women, Children & Family Health Science, University of Illinois at Chicago, USA.
⁷ Department of Nutrition Science, Purdue University, USA.

Abstract

We study the relationship between the food environment (FE) and the food purchase patterns, dietary intakes, and nutritional status of individuals in peri-urban Tanzania. In Africa, the prevailing high density of informal vendors creates challenges to characterizing the FE. We present a protocol and tool developed as part of the Diet, Environment, and Choices of positive living (DECIDE) study to measure characteristics of the FE. We mapped 6627 food vendors in a peri-urban settlement of Dar es Salaam, of which over 60% were semi-formal and informal (mobile) vendors. We compute and compare four FE metrics inspired by landscape ecology-density, dispersion, diversity, and dominance-to better understand how the informal food environment relates to food purchase patterns, diets, and nutritional status among households with persons living with human immunodeficiency virus (PLHIV).

Keywords: Adults; Diets; Food environment; Food purchase patterns; Informal economy; PLHIV; Tanzania.