Urban en rural dietary patterns in Greece in the years 1957-2008; an economic analysis

This paper attempts to describe and study in detail the evolution of urban and rural dietary
patterns in Greece during the period 1957-2008, in terms of natural and technical features. Natural
features refer to the consumption of animal versus plant products, while technical features pertain to
agricultural and industrial products consumption. The analysis leads to a conclusion that the dietary
patterns obtain internationalized, industrial origin and growing share of animal products, while the
weight of tradition (i.e. Mediterranean plant products and services) weakens in Greece after World
War II. Additionally, during this period the urban and rural dietary patterns, by comparison, have
evolved at different paces and characteristics; the rural dietary patterns converged to urban ones with
‘asymmetric’ way, time lag and significant particularities.