Future food prices will become less sensitive to agricultural market prices and 
mitigation costs

Chen, David Meng-Chuen; Bodirsky, Benjamin Leon; Wang, Xiaoxi; Xuan, Jiaqi; Dietrich, Jan Philipp; Popp, Alexander; Lotze-Campen, Hermann

doi:10.1038/s43016-024-01099-3

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Future food prices will become less sensitive to agricultural market prices and mitigation costs

Authors

/persons/resource/david.chen

Chen, David Meng-Chuen
Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research;
Submitting Corresponding Author, Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research;

/persons/resource/Bodirsky

Bodirsky, Benjamin Leon
Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research;

/persons/resource/xiaoxi.wang

Wang, Xiaoxi
Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research;

Xuan, Jiaqi
External Organizations;

/persons/resource/Jan.Dietrich

Dietrich, Jan Philipp
Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research;

/persons/resource/Alexander.Popp

Popp, Alexander
Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research;

/persons/resource/Lotze-Campen

Lotze-Campen, Hermann
Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research;

External Ressource

https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.12926687
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31594oa.pdf
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Citation

Chen, D.-M.-C., Bodirsky, B. L., Wang, X., Xuan, J., Dietrich, J. P., Popp, A., Lotze-Campen, H. (2025): Future food prices will become less sensitive to agricultural market prices and mitigation costs. - Nature Food, 6, 85-96.
https://doi.org/10.1038/s43016-024-01099-3

Cite as: https://publications.pik-potsdam.de/pubman/item/item_31594

Abstract

Agricultural production costs represent less than half of total food prices for higher-income countries and will likely further decrease globally. Added-value components such as transport, processing, marketing and catering show increasing importance in food value chains, especially as countries undergo a nutrition transition towards more complex and industrial food systems. Here, using a combined statistical and process-based modelling framework, we derive and project the value-added component of food prices for 136 countries and 11 different food groups, for food-at-home and food-away-from-home. We identify the declining but differentiated producer share in consumer food prices across food products, and provide scenarios of future consumer prices under a business-as-usual as well as climate mitigation scenarios. Food price increases from policies targeting agricultural producers, such as greenhouse gas taxes, are not as stark when transmitted to consumers owing to higher value added in higher-income countries, while a pronounced effect remains in lower-income countries, even in coming decades.