Food safety and the health of middle-aged and elderly people: Evidence from China

Abstract

Food safety is among the most important determinants of the health of citizens, the middle-aged and elderly in particular. Chinese governments have introduced policies to ensure food safety, which has attracted wide attention from academia. Based on the China Health and Retirement Longitudinal Study database from 2011 to 2018, we consider the Food Safety Pilot Cities (FSPCs) introduced by the Food Safety Commission in 2014 as an exogenous shock, and adopt the Staggered Difference in Difference (Staggered DID) method to evaluate the health effects of food safety regulation policy. We find that safeguarding food safety significantly reduced the probability of chronic diseases among the middle-aged and elderly, yet its impact varied according to the age and education level of the individuals. The empirical conclusions still hold after rich robustness tests. We also find that the establishment of pilot cities improved the daily living skills, cognitive abilities and self-assessment health of middle-aged and senior citizens, but showed no obvious influence on mental health. Furthermore, the FSPCs also increase food consumption expenditure by building confidence in food safety among residents. Therefore, it is of significance to take advantage of the role the policy has played on the health of middle-aged and elderly people, so as to achieve harmonious thriving of urban construction as well as human health.