Still waiting for Godot? Improving Household Consumption and Expenditures Surveys (HCES) to enable more evidence-based nutrition policies

The constrained evidence base of food and nutrition policy-making compromises nutrition programs. Nutrition policy-making must do better than relying exclusively on Food and Agriculture Organization Food Balance Sheets. The strategy of relying on observed weighed food record or 24-hour recall surveys has not proven practical either; they remain few in number, generally not nationally representative, and of dubious external validity. Although Household Consumption and Expenditures Surveys (HCES) have shortcomings, they are increasingly being used to address this information gap. The objective of the paper is to promote dialog within the nutrition community, and between it and the greater community of HCES stakeholders, in order to identify their shared agenda and develop a strategy to improve HCES for analyzing food and nutrition issues. (Paper published in: : Food & Nutrition Bulletin, Volume 33, Supplement 2, September 2012 , pp. 242S-251S(10))