World Vision research examining food affordability in
more than 60 countries finds that food is around 15 times
less affordable in some Pacific nations than in New
Zealand.
The aid organisation’s annual Price Shocks
survey compares the cost of 10 staples such as rice, flour,
eggs, milk, cooking oil and chicken with the average income
in 62 countries.
The report, released for World Food
Day (October 16), reveals that New Zealand ranks among the
10 most affordable nations for food. At the other end of the
spectrum, the report finds food is very unaffordable in some
of the world’s poorest countries, including Malawi, Sudan,
and Somalia.
In the Pacific, food affordability is
challenging in Papua New Guinea and Solomon Islands where
people need to work more than four days to pay for a basket
of food staples compared with New Zealanders who need to
work just 2.2 hours to pay for the same 10 food
items.
World Vision New Zealand’s Head of
International Partnerships, Stephen Court, says New
Zealanders understand the pressure of food price inflation,
but our challenges pale in comparison to many other
countries.
“New Zealanders understand the sacrifices
that families may have to make due to the rising cost of
food, but our daily experience is magnified tenfold or more
in other parts of the world. Our neighbours in Papua New
Guinea and Solomon Islands are working more than four days
to afford basic staples while in Malawi it takes around 20
days to afford a basic basket of food.
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“And when food
costs that much, parents don’t stop feeding their kids,
they feed them less, or differently. Meat disappears first,
then vegetables and fruit and then slowly but surely
children are on a pathway toward hunger, malnutrition, and
stunting which can have lifelong impacts. In Papua
New
Guinea alone, nearly half of children have stunted
growth.”
In 2025, an estimated 35.5 million children
were acutely malnourished worldwide, including nearly 10
million suffering severe acute malnutrition [i]
. Meanwhile, healthy diets remain out of reach for one
in three people worldwide [ii]
.
“A lack of nutritious food causes so much harm.
Malnutrition can curb children’s physical and cognitive
development, weaken their immunity and increase their risk
of death. These devastating impacts can continue throughout
childhood and into adulthood and are not always easily
reversed,” Court says.
He says in countries impacted
by conflict, economic crises, or severe climate change and
weather events, the cost of a basket of food can be
astronomical. In Sudan for instance, it takes 19.3 days to
pay for a food basket, while in the Central African Republic
it’s 30 days.
Court says the impact of climate
change in the Pacific is particularly acute and dramatically
affects families’ ability to grow and access enough
nutritious food.
In light of escalating food
affordability issues globally, World Vision is calling on
governments, donors, businesses, and international
institutions to take action to improve the affordability of
food around the world. In particular, the organisation wants
to see:
- School meals programmes strengthened in
many countries - Greater investment in local food
systems and livelihoods so that communities can withstand
global shocks - Businesses take responsibility for
respecting children’s right to adequate food, including by
helping ensure nutritious food remains affordable and
accessible for families. - Action to address conflict,
climate, and economic pressures that continue to keep
nutritious food out of reach for millions of children and
families. - Investment in emergency food aid to ensure
children and communities affected by conflict and
displacement can access nutritious food.
Court
says it’s vital that New Zealand boosts the role it plays
in supporting food security in the Pacific where one in six
children under the age of five are malnourished. [iii]
He
says World Vision is already working in partnership with the
Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade to improve nutrition
and the resilience of local food systems in several Pacific
countries, including Papua New Guinea, Solomon Islands, and
Vanuatu and this needs to be continued and
expanded.
New Zealanders wanting to support World
Vision’s work to improve nutrition and food security in
the Pacific can donate here: https://wvnz.org.nz/donate-to-pacific
Notes:
- Price
Shocks 2026 is World Vision’s fifth annual food price
survey. World Vision staff and volunteers collected prices
in local markets, shops and supermarkets between November
2025 and May 2026 for 10 items: bananas, rice, wheat flour,
raw sugar, maize, eggs, cooking oil, chicken, tomatoes and
milk. - Costs were converted to US dollars, adjusted
using purchasing power parity (PPP) exchange rates, and
compared with average national income (GNI PPP per capita),
assuming an eight-hour workday. - 62 countries took
part; 60 reported complete baskets and 56 were included in
the hours-of-work analysis. - A basket of 10 basic
foods takes about 2.2 hours of average work to buy in New
Zealand, which ranks among the 10 most affordable of 56
countries analysed. - In the Pacific, the basket takes
4.1 days in Papua New Guinea and 4.4 days in the Solomon
Islands. They are the only Pacific Island countries in the
survey. - The least affordable country is the Central
African Republic, at 30.1 days (almost 241 hours). 11
countries need more than a week of work: CAR, Malawi (20.4
days), Sudan (19.3), DRC (14.5), Mozambique (13.4), Chad
(13), Somalia (11.3), Myanmar (10.1), Haiti (9.5), Zambia
(8.5) and Uganda (7.3). - Across 47 countries with
comparable data, the cost of the basket rose in 33 between
2024 and 2026, by 28.3% on average. In the 14 countries
where costs fell, the average drop was 13.2%. - Six
countries saw rises of more than 50%: Zimbabwe (+123%),
Malawi (+112%), China (+79%), Zambia (+61%), Ukraine (+52%)
and Albania (+51%). - The average time to afford the
basket across 56 countries was 34.3 hours (about 4.3
workdays), down from 39.4 hours in 2024. - Four
countries (Afghanistan, South Sudan, Syria and Venezuela)
were excluded from the hours-of-work analysis because
reliable income data was unavailable, and Burundi and Niger
were not included. Because the figures are national
averages, they can mask differences between households. The
survey doesn’t assess food insecurity within New
Zealand.
About World Vision
World Vision
is a humanitarian organisation dedicated to supporting the
most vulnerable children, families and communities overcome
poverty and injustice.
[i]
https://www.fightfoodcrises.net/global-report-food-crises
[ii]
https://openknowledge.fao.org/server/api/core/bitstreams/fbd7e989-deb5-415b-a5b9-bfa08269b9d7/content
[iii]
https://www.unicef.org/pacificislands/press-releases/1-6-children-pacific-region-live-severe-child-food-poverty-due-hardship-inequity-and
