Distribution Dynamics of Dietary Energy Supply in the World

This paper investigates the law of motion for the cross-section distribution of dietary energy supply (DES) in the world. This has been pursued using the distribution approach and a panel of 152 countries for the period 1961-2001. According to the empirical results, persistence in caloric intakes dominates in the short-run. With time, however, upwards mobility gains momentum and the world is moving towards a long-run distribution, which is strongly skewed to the left. The estimated expected first passage times from extreme under-supply to higher intake levels are consistent with speculations that most of the developing countries will attain the 3000 kcal per person per day level by the year 2030.