Taxation Online Experimental Supermarket
For patients and families
In plain language
An automatic summary of structured registry data. It is an orientation aid, not a substitute for the official protocol or a physician assessment.
- What is being studied
- The protocol lists: Taxation, Subsidies.
- Who it may be relevant to
- Registry conditions: Nutrition, Food Purchasing Intention. Basic parameters: from 18 years · All.
- What needs checking
- Age, condition and sex are only basic indicators. Prior treatment, laboratory values and other mandatory requirements appear in the eligibility criteria below.
- Where it takes place
- France
- Next step
- Save the trial, show it to the treating physician, and confirm current recruitment with the study center. Costs, documents and travel →
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Official title
Impact of Taxation and Subsidies on the Nutrition Quality of Purchases in an Online Experimental Supermarket, Overall and by Income Level: a Randomized Control Trial
Overview
Scientific context The increase in the consumption of unhealthy food coupled with a suboptimal consumption of healthier options have increased the risk of non-communicable diseases (NCD) worldwide. Among other public policies to address the rise in NCD -such as front of pack labelling, regulation of food and beverages in schools, marketing regulations targeted to children- taxation has been recognized as a cost-effective strategy to reduce consumption of taxed products. Although subsidies have been used to reduce food insecurity, with the rise in NCD associated with unhealthy diets, studies have explored the feasibility of combining subsidies to incentivize the consumption healthy food with taxes on unhealthy options. The impact of prices on dietary behaviour of consumers has been demonstrated in experimental designs as well as in economic analysis of observational data on purchases. Although some experimental studies have been used to study the impact of taxation and subsidies among specific populations in France, none has evaluated the impact in the general population. Objective The aim of the study is to evaluate the impact of implementing taxes on unhealthy food and beverages and subsidies to healthy food, separately and combined, on the nutritional quality of purchases, overall and by income level, in an experimental online supermarket. Intervention description: The intervention includes taxation of lower nutritional quality products (identified using the front-of-pack nutrition label Nutri-Score - classes D and E) and/or subsidies for products of higher nutritional quality (identified as raw products or Nutri-Score A and B). Design The intervention will be a parallel arm randomized trial stratified by income against a control situation with no changes in prices and the presence of the Nutri-Score on-pack for all pre-packed products in all interventions (control, taxes and subsidies). Expected public health impact: This study will allow to investigate the potential synergistic effect on the nutritional quality of food choices of combining taxation and income-based subsidies in a context of social inequalities in rising non-communicable disease associated with poor diets. Following a proportional universalism perspective, income-based subsidies can mitigate the regressivity of taxation according to income. As no countries have implemented this combination of fiscal policies to improve diets, the results of this study will contribute to the scientific knowledge on the topic and will provide preliminary results to decision makers.
Interventions
- Behavioral Taxation
Taxation of 8% of Nutri-Score D-labeled products Taxation of 16% of Nutri-Score E-labeled products - Behavioral Subsidies
Subsidies in the form of a discount voucher of 15€/household member
Primary outcome measures
- NS-2023 NPM score [Time frame: Peri-procedure (end of shopping session)]
Secondary outcome measures (11)
- Energy [Time frame: Peri-procedure (end of shopping session)]
- Saturated fatty acids [Time frame: Peri-procedure (end of shopping session)]
- Sugars [Time frame: Peri-procedure (end of shopping session)]
- Salt [Time frame: Peri-procedure (end of shopping session)]
- Fibers [Time frame: Peri-procedure (end of shopping session)]
- Proteins [Time frame: Peri-procedure (end of shopping session)]
- Fruit and vegetables [Time frame: Peri-procedure (end of shopping session)]
- Food categories [Time frame: Peri-procedure (end of shopping session)]
- Purchase cost [Time frame: Peri-procedure (end of shopping session)]
- Lespeyres price index [Time frame: Peri-procedural (end of shopping session)]
- Passche price index [Time frame: Peri-procedure (end of shopping session)]
Eligibility criteria
Inclusion criteria
- Adult subjects (>18 years old) included in the NutriNet-Santé cohort study from all income levels.
- For the subsidies + taxation arm: inclusion only of low income-participants (below the poverty threshold 1,288€ - 60% of the median standard of living of the population)
Exclusion criteria
⁃ Subjects never engaging in grocery shopping. Participants will be excluded for this based on self-reported grocery shopping frequency using a short questionnaire at the inception of the study.
Criteria are shown verbatim from the registry (in English). Final eligibility is always assessed by the study center.
Healthy volunteers: Yes
Study design
- Allocation
- Randomized
- Model
- Parallel assignment
- Masking
- Double blind
- Primary purpose
- Prevention
Study locations
France · 1 center
- Université Sorbonne Paris Nord — Bobigny
Identifiers
NCT: NCT07593937 · INSERM 25-1264