Soaring food prices are reshaping what Iranian families eat, with new figures showing a steep decline in dairy consumption alongside a longer retreat from red meat as household purchasing power erodes.
Annual dairy consumption has fallen from around 130 kilograms per person in 2010 to just 40 kilograms today, according to Ali Ehsan Zafari, head of Iran’s Dairy Cooperatives Union.
According to the latest figures from the Statistical Center of Iran, dairy products in July cost around 147 percent more than a year earlier.
The fall in consumption leaves Iran well below both international and regional levels. Global dairy consumption averages roughly 117–119 kilograms per person annually, according to the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), while neighboring Turkey consumes more than 250 kilograms per capita.
At 40 kilograms, Iran’s consumption is now roughly one-third of the global average.
Meat disappears
The retreat from dairy follows a longer change in Iranian diets as years of inflation and declining purchasing power have pushed households away from more expensive sources of animal protein.
FAO data show Iran’s red meat supply fell to approximately 623,000 metric tons last year, around 20 percent lower than in 2024 and nearly 39 percent below its 2010 level.
Over much of that period, poultry offered families a cheaper alternative. Per capita poultry consumption has risen by roughly 40 percent since 2010, suggesting households have increasingly substituted chicken for more expensive beef and lamb.
The comparison with Turkey illustrates how differently consumption has developed across the two neighboring countries.
Poultry consumption in Turkey also rose by about 40 percent over the same period, but red meat consumption increased by 146 percent. FAO estimates put per capita red meat consumption in Turkey at roughly 3.9 times the Iranian level.
The figures do not by themselves explain the reasons for the divergence, but Iran’s shift toward cheaper poultry has taken place during a prolonged erosion of household purchasing power and repeated surges in food prices.
Fewer alternatives
That substitution is becoming harder as inflation spreads across virtually every source of animal protein.
Prices of beef, lamb and chicken were all around 149 percent higher in July than a year earlier, according to the Statistical Center of Iran. Dairy prices rose by a similar 147 percent.
The latest increases follow the recent war, which added to existing inflationary pressures and accelerated price rises across basic goods.
For years, households unable to afford beef and lamb could turn to chicken. The sharp increase in poultry prices now threatens that fallback, while the collapse in dairy consumption suggests even relatively basic sources of animal protein are becoming harder for many families to afford.
The consequences are potentially significant, particularly for lower-income households and children whose diets depend on affordable sources of protein and calcium.
But the figures also point to a broader change in Iranian living standards: families are not simply paying more for the same food. They are changing what they eat, and increasingly giving up foods that were once ordinary parts of the household diet.
After years of substituting cheaper foods for more expensive ones, the narrowing range of affordable alternatives raises a more immediate question: what is left to substitute?
The original article was published on Iran International