With 42 percent of Chinese citizens overweight or obese, new dietary guidelines issued by the government recommend eating less meat and fat while consuming more vegetables and dairy — advice being heard in many nations. The suggestion for meat, 58 grams or 2 ounces a day, is half of current consumption levels.
“In general, Chinese eating habits raise the risk of obesity,” said state-run China Daily when the guidelines, the first update since 2007, were issued in mid-May. A quarter of adults have hypertension and 10 percent have diabetes, it said. The government launched a publicity campaign this week for the guidelines.
Besides reducing the risk of heart disease, diabetes and other chronic illnesses, a 50-percent reduction in meat consumption “would significantly cut global greenhouse gas emissions,” said “5 To Do Today,” a campaign to mitigate climate change through individual behavior change. The group said a survey in December found 83 percent of respondents “were willing to eat vegetarian at least one day each week for their health and the planet, with 62 percent willing to eat vegetarian for two or more days each week.”
“The new Chinese guidance is the latest in a wave of national-level activity to tackle excessive meat-eating habits in industrialized and emerging economies,” said analysts at think tank Chatham House, of London. “The past two years have seen revised dietary guidelines in the United States, Sweden, the UK and the Netherlands, each of which recommended a reduction in meat consumption from current levels.”
Americans will consume an average 9 ounces of beef, pork and poultry per day this year, USDA estimates. While U.S. meat production and consumption is fairly stable, production has soared in China. In a 2014 report, USDA economists said Chinese output, 20 million tonnes in 1986, shot to 70 million tonnes in 2012 and would reach 90 million tonnes in 2023/24. “Since about 3 kilograms of feed are needed to produce each kilogram of meat, feeding a large and increasing population of animals will be a growing challenge,” said USDA. Pork is China’s favorite meat; it raises and consumes half of the pork in the world.
“Much evidence has shown that long-term over-consumption of meat, especially processed meat, will impose adverse effects on our body, affecting our health in the long run,” Yang Yuexin, head of the Chinese Nutrition Society, said in a “5 To Do Today” interview. Other officials said Chinese consume too many calories over all, including meat, fat, oil and salt.
The portion of the population that is overweight has soared as the country has become increasingly urbanized. In 2002, nearly 23 percent of Chinese adults were overweight. Now, just over 30 percent are overweight, up 7.3 points in 10 years. An additional 12 percent of Chinese adults are obese. Among children, 23 percent of boys and 14 percent of girls are overweight or obese, according to a 2014 study published in the medical journal The Lancet. “Like many developed countries, China has found that bad habits come with greater wealth,” said a Wall Street Journal article about the study. “For China, lack of exercise and unhealthy diets have helped fuel an onslaught of obesity-linked diseases.”
The Chatham House analysts, Antony Froggett and Laura Wellesley, said besides the health benefits of lower meat consumption, there would be environmental gains from “sustainable eating patterns.” The Danish government debated in April the imposition of a carbon tax on meat, they said. The “5 To Do Today” campaign said if everyone in China followed the new dietary guidelines, greenhouse gas emissions due to meat production in the country would drop by the equivalent of 1.5 percent of global emissions.
In January, the administration issued a new edition of the Dietary Guidelines for Americans that endorsed a diet with a variety of fruits, vegetables, lean meats and poultry, eggs, legumes, nuts, seeds and soy products. The Republican-controlled Congress directed the administration to omit any consideration of sustainability in drafting the guidelines, although an advisory panel of experts said it should, for the first time, be a factor in diet advice. The cattle industry complained the advisory panel was biased against red meat.
Like the United States, China has used graphics to present its dietary advice, including a five-tiered food guide pagoda somewhat similar to USDA’s four-level Food Pyramid, introduced in 1992. The U.S. pyramid was replaced in 2011 by My Plate, which “illustrates the five food groups that are the building blocks for a healthy diet using a familiar image — a place setting for a meal.”