Demand for the main food commodities in Slovenia Darja REGORŠEK, Emil ERJAVEC and Lovrenc PFAJFAR 1 Abstract The objective of this research is to analyse food consumption patterns in Slovenia for households segmented by quartile income levels and for whole Slovenian population. Food items are divided into seven commodity groups. Cross-sectional household data from Household Budget Survey 2001 were used. We apply the linearly approximated Almost Ideal Demand System (LA/AIDS). Empirical results show positive expenditure elasticities being close to one where in general demands for dairy products and for vegetables have expenditure elasticities higher than unity. All Marshallian and Hicksian own price elasticities are negative and less than one. Demand for meat and fish is quite price inelastic whereas demand for vegetables is pretty sensitive to its own price changes. Results indicate that Slovenia is losing consumption characteristics typical for countries in transition however, some unique food habits persists. Keywords: food demand system, LA/AIDS, expenditure and price elasticities, Household Budget Survey 1. Introduction Some studies estimating demand for goods and services have ignored required connections between theory and empirical analysis (e.g. exclusion of price terms) and concentrated on the estimation of single demand equations. Given the doubts of the results of such an approach, empirical work has been directed towards the estimation of complete 1 * Published 2006 in the Jahrbuch der Österreichischen Gesellschaft für Agrarökonomie, Vol. 15, pp. 11-21. Available on-line: www.boku.ac.at/oega