An Economic Analysis of Food Consumption Pattern in West Bengal with Special Reference to Dairy Products

India is the world's second-largest producer of food next to China and has the potential of being the biggest industry. It is necessary to study the consumption pattern under the changing situations of liberalization, privatization and globalization. The average monthly per capita consumer expenditure (MPCE) in 2004–05 was 599 and 1052 in rural and urban India. The share of nonvegetable items was found to be more in high monthly per capita expenditure groups ( 433.49). The expenditure on cereals was found to be increasing with increase in total expenditure. Thus the consumption of cereals declined in Kolkata over the periods. The monthly per capita consumption of pulses was almost stable over the two periods in Kolkata. The overall per capita monthly expenditure was lowest for butter than curd and paneer. The percent share of per capita monthly expenditure found for curd was lower than ghee and ice-cream. There were positive association between the type of family and annual food expenditure revealed that the annual expenditure would be more for joint families. The food habit dummy exerted a positive influence on food expenditure for consumers. The positive relation implied that the food expenditure would be more for non-vegetarian consumers. The expenditure elasticity was almost near to one in the case of milk, vegetables. The expenditure elasticities for different food items varied between 0.72 and 1.014 in the case of cereals and non-veg items.