| Micronutrient deficiency,often described as “hidden hunger”,is a widespread problem in developing countries.Around the globe,nearly 2.5 billion people suffer from “Hidden Hunger”,including 300 million people in China.Due to China's traditional dietary structure,micronutrient deficiency has a greater negative impact in poverty-stricken and rural areas where diets usually consist of relatively cheap staple crops,lacking enough food with high nutritive value.Micronutrient deficiency not only increases morbidity,mortality and health burden,but also brings huge economic losses to our country,which impedes the realization of eliminating poverty and slows down the process of socialist modernization in China.Therefore,the control of micronutrient malnutrition has become an important development issue in China,whose significance is further emphasized in "Healthy China 2030" plan outline issued by central government.At present,there are four nutrition interventions to fight “Hidden Hunger”,including dietary structure adjustment,nutrition supplementation,food fortification and biofortification.However,due to the social and economic shortcomings,the first three interventions cannot cover most of rural areas.As an intervention based on agriculture,biofortification can efficiently and effectively improve the health condition of people in poverty-stricken areas through plantation and consumption of the staple crop with relatively high micronutrient content,which has significant health advantages and economic benefits.However,the large-scale planting and promotion of biofortification in China started comparatively late,and its actual impact is still unclear.Therefore,it is essential for improving micronutrient deficiency,relieving health burden and maintain social stability to investigate the positive influence of consuming biofortified product on health and nutrition status of population and its economic evaluation.Based on the perspective of nutrition improvement,this study adopts the interdisciplinary theories and methods of agricultural economics,health economics,development economics and experimental economics and takes the DALYs method,randomized controlled trial and BDM experiment mechanism as analysis frameworks and innovative from the macro and micro perspectives,using the method of combination of pre-analysis and post analysis to explore the economic evaluation of biofortification agricultural products.The main research contents include the construction of macro level economic evaluation indicators,macro level economic evaluation analysis,micro level health benefits analysis and micro level economic benefits analysis.From the perspective of macro-economic evaluation,micro health benefits and economic benefits,this study makes an in-depth discussion on the improvement of population nutrition and economic evaluation of Chi-nese biofortification agricultural products,to provide guidance and basis for the promotion,adoption and policy-making of biofortification agricultural products.This study adopts the method of combining pre-analysis and post-analysis and carries out empirical analysis from the macro level and micro level.The full text includes four main research contents.The first is the economic evaluation method and construction of index system of biofortification agricultural products in the macro level.This chapter introduces and revises the DALYs method,which is the economic evaluation method of biofortification agricultural products.Based on the DALYs formula of measuring health capital in health economics,economic evaluation index system of biofortification agricultural products in the macro level is constructed,aiming at explaining health and economic benefits of biofortification agricultural products and analyzing cost-benefit,to clarify economic value of biofortification agricultural products and provide basis for the promotion of biofortification.The health benefits and economic benefits of biofortification agricultural products mainly refer to the health benefits and economic benefits of iron fortification agricultural products,zinc fortification agricultural products,vitamin A fortification agricultural products and folate fortification agricultural products,while the cost-benefit mainly include cost,cost-benefit rate and cost effectiveness of biofortification agricultural products.Through the construction of macro level economic evaluation index,it provides the basis for the macro level economic evaluation analysis.Second is the economic evaluation analysis of biofortification agricultural products in the macro level.Based on the DALYs formula and economic evaluation index constructed in the previous chapter,this chapter uses the method of pre-analysis to carry out the economic evaluation of biofortification agricultural products,taking folate fortified rice as an example,to understand health benefits,economic benefits and cost-benefits of biofortification agricultural products.The cost-effectiveness of biofortification agricultural products is compared with other countries and other fortified measures to explain economic benefits in the macro level and provide support for the government to carry out and promote biofortification agricultural products.And economic evaluation in the macro level shows the feasibility of biofortification agricultural products,which lays the foundation for the micro level analysis.This chapter analyzes economic value of folate fortified rice from the macro level,making up for the limitations of previous macro level analysis.Then is the empirical analysis of health benefits of biofortification agricultural products in the micro level.On the basis of making clear the economic benefits of crop nutrition fortified agricultural products at the macro level,two nutrition intervention experiments were carried out in Nanyang County of Henan Province and Zepu County of Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region by using the method of randomized controlled experiment to measure the health benefits of crop nutrition fortified agricultural products at the macro level.Since considerable economic benefits of biofortification agricultural products,two nutrition intervention experiments were carried out in Nanyang,Henan Province and Zepu County,Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region by using the method of randomized controlled trials to measure health benefits in development economics,respectively,to investigate health benefits of biofortification agricultural products from the micro level by post analysis.Folate deficiency rate in Henan Province is one of the highest in China and folate supplementation awareness of women of childbearing age in this area is low,which is an appropriate place to carry out the nutrition experiment of folate fortified maize.Therefore,this study designed and implemented a 67 days nutrition intervention experiment of folate fortified maize to understand the effect of folate fortified maize on folate deficiency in women of childbearing age.123 women of childbearing age were enrolled in the experiment.Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region has a high zinc deficiency rate,a remote geographical location and limited coverage of other interventions.Biofortification is an effective measure to improve zinc deficiency in this region.Therefore,Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region is a suitable place to carry out zinc fortified wheat nutrition intervention experiments.In this study,we designed and implemented the zinc fortified wheat experiment for 8 months to understand the effect of zinc fortified wheat on growth retardation of adolescents,242 people participated in the experiment.In this chapter,two randomized controlled trials were carried out to test the impact of biofortification agricultural products on population nutrition and health.Based on the previous macro analysis,health benefits and external validity of biofortification agricultural products were further verified from the micro level by post analysis.Finally,is the empirical analysis of economic benefits of biofortification agricultural products in the micro level.Explore consumers' willingness to pay for folate rich maize,and to provide basis for understanding economic benefits and market potential of folate rich maize.In this chapter,since biofortification can effectively improve the nutritional health of the population and have good cost-benefit,the frontier research tool BDM mechanism of experimental economics is used to understand consumers' willingness to pay for folate rich maize.Consumers' willingness to pay for nutrition improvement information is an effective tool to understand economic benefits of folate rich maize.BDM experiment still carried out in Nanyang,Henan Province,because nutrition intervention experiment was carried out in this area,which had the basis of preliminary work.There is a high folate deficiency rate in Henan Province,which urgently needs to be improved and effective improvement cannot be separated from large-scale promotion,which is affected by the economic benefits and market potential,so it is necessary to understand willingness to pay for folate rich maize in this area.185 subjects participated in the experiment.BDM mechanism design can not only understand true willingness to pay of consumers,reduce “insincere” bidding,but also ensure randomness of samples;therefore,we can better understand market potential and economic benefits of folate rich maize.Moreover,probit model is used to analyze the determinants of consumers' willingness to pay in the micro level,to provide guidance for the production and sales of enterprises.The basic conclusion of the study shows that,(1)based on DALYs formula,economic evaluation index system of biofortification agricultural products in the macro level is an effective quantitative tool for health benefits,economic benefits and cost-benefits research.The health benefits indexes mainly mean the reduction of disease burden caused by biofortification.The economic benefit indexes mean using the standard value to monetize the reduction of disease burden.Cost-benefits indexes mainly include cost,cost effectiveness and cost benefit ratio.(2)In the aspect of macroscopically economic evaluation,it is found that the effect of folate fortified rice is significant and economic.The disease burden caused by micronutrient deficiency can reduce 86 385.96-173 836.32 DALYs after one-year nutritional intervention.After monetization,reduction of DALYs caused by folate fortified rice can bring 295 008 053 yuan(pessimistic)to 1 187 302 066 yuan(optimistic)of economic benefits.The cost-benefit ratio of project is 40.12(pessimistic estimate)to 161.46(optimistic estimate),that is,each $1 input can bring $40.12(pessimistic estimate)to $161.46(optimistic estimate)output,which has a high cost-benefit ratio.The cost effectiveness of folate fortified rice is from 12.46(pessimistic estimate)to 6.19(optimistic estimate).The cost of folate fortified rice be $12.46(pessimistic estimate)to $6.19(optimistic estimate)for each DALYs losses reduction,which shows that folate fortified rice is also cost-effective in China;(3)In the micro level,biofortification agricultural products have good health benefits and can significantly improve the nutritional health status of the population.First of all,nutrition intervention experiment of folate fortified maize in Henan Province has significant effect,which can effectively improve folate deficiency of women of childbearing age to a certain extent;Secondly,although the effect of zinc fortified wheat nutrition intervention experiment in Xinjiang is relatively weak,it may be restricted by processing methods;(4)In the micro level,biofortification agricultural products have good economic benefits,and consumers have higher willingness to pay for it.BDM experiments conducted in Henan Province show that folate enhanced information can effectively enhance willingness to pay of women of childbearing age.The willingness to pay for folate rich maize is significantly higher than that of normal maize.The mean WTP for folate rich maize is 2.88 yuan in the survey area,and the mean WTP for normal maize is 1.41 yuan.Demographic characteristics and knowledge level significantly affect willingness to pay of women of childbearing age for folate rich maize.The main innovation of the current research is to investigate the health and economic benefits of biofortified product in a new perspective of combining macro and micro level by using of agricultural economics,health economics,development economics and experimental economics and other interdisciplinary theories and methods comprehensively.Firstly,the DALYs formula for measuring health capital in the field of health economics was modified and improved according to actual situation of China.On this basis,economic evaluation index system of biofortified product in macro level is constructed,by which we evaluate the macro economic benefit of biofortification in our country.Secondly,health benefits of biofortification in micro level are revealed through two randomized controlled trials,which is lacked in previous researches.Finally,BDM mechanism which studies willingness to pay and economic benefits in experimental economics is used to explore the real willingness to pay of individuals for biofortified products in micro level,which can effectively reflect the economic benefits of biofortification,filling the gap of previous research on willingness to pay.In current study,the health and economic benefits of biofortified products in China are explained from macro and micro perspectives,which provide a basis for the further development of biofortification. |
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