Previous studies have shown that highly nutritious diets are more costly, but to date there has been no evaluation of the costs associated with failing to meet micronutrient recommendations in a Spanish population.

We examined whether daily food consumption costs (classified in quintiles) were associated with failing to meet at least three daily nutritional recommendations out of twenty (including fibre and nineteen micronutrients) in a cross-sectional analysis of baseline data of a cohort of 17 197 Spanish university graduates. Micronutrients and fibre intake were assessed with a validated 136-item FFQ. Average cost of food was calculated from official Spanish government data.

As participants presented higher dietary energy cost from their diet, their intake of micronutrients increased significantly. Low dietary energy cost was associated with a higher likelihood of failing to meet three or more recommendations (P for trend <0·001 across quintiles of dietary cost), the association being stronger among female than male participants (P for interaction between sex and quintile of dietary energy cost <0·001).