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From data privacy to labeling laws and consumer trust, the intersection of technology and food policy is a rich, evolving field, and we’re just beginning to explore it.
Norbert Wilson, Director, Duke World Food Policy Center
By Zyra Dent and Jenny Edmonds
When we shop for groceries online, every click tells a story, and Norbert Wilson wants to know who’s listening, recording, and retelling that tale. As Director of the World Food Policy Center and Professor of Food, Economics, and Community at Duke University, Norbert Wilson is exploring how technology and policy shape our most basic choices.
Watching what you eat
Unlike pushing a basket through the aisles of your neighborhood store, many online grocery shoppers are giving away data about their preferences and purchases as they put items in their electronic carts. One of Wilson’s recent research projects examined how consumers navigate online grocery shopping, revealing what people are and aren’t willing to trade for convenience. In one experiment, he and his collaborators created a simulated online grocery store.
Wilson and his co-authors have many questions about how consumers expectations and behavior around privacy and food purchasing. “Participants make choices between different profiles of online grocery stores,” Wilson explained. “Each profile describes how much information is collected, from your name and address, to what you purchase, or even how you move around a website.”
Preliminary evidence suggests that some people are strongly opposed to their data being sold to third parties, notes Wilson. This sort of scholarship highlights questions at the intersection of technology policy and food policy contains many opportunities for decision-making and research.
Reducing burden or deepening inequalities, or both
The research in this area extends beyond privacy; Wilson has questions about equity and access issues that arise as grocery shopping moves online. “We’re especially interested in how Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) participants use online platforms,” he said. “Online shopping could reduce transportation burdens, especially for parents [with young children] or people living in areas with limited food access, but cost and digital access remain big questions.”
Nutrition labeling in a digital world
Wilson and his colleagues are also examining how nutrition labeling appears online, especially where information can be incomplete or strategically placed. “In a physical store, you can pick up a product and turn it around,” he noted. “Online, information placement is everything. Should nutrition facts appear directly under the picture? What if technology could summarize the nutrition quality of your entire basket?”
Wilson’s work also highlights that there are few public policies addressing what nutrition information grocery retailers are required to share online.
How (and why) this Duke scholar is exploring the future of food
For Wilson, these questions build to a broader concern: who benefits when data and algorithms guide our food choices? “Even when data are used to ‘help’ us shop, is that help actually beneficial?” he asked. “Are we being guided toward healthier, cheaper options, or toward more profitable ones for the retailer?” It’s a line of inquiry that blends economics, ethics, and equity, indicators of Wilson’s interdisciplinary approach to public policy.
Origins that ground his perspective
That integrative lens is rooted in Wilson’s journey from Dawson, Georgia, a small agricultural community known for its peanut fields. From his early experiences in 4-H to his academic work in agricultural economics, Wilson’s path has been marked by curiosity and interest in the intersectionality of public policy. His research has informed national policy conversations, from food labeling and waste reduction to SNAP access and consumer trust. It continues to evolve alongside the technologies that shape our daily lives.