World now has more fat people than hungry ones: expert
by Lawrence Bartlett Mon Aug 14, 5:22 AM ET
Quote:
SYDNEY (AFP) - The world now has more overweight people than hungry ones and governments should design economic strategies to influence national diets, a conference of international experts have heard.
The transition from a starving world to an obese one had happened with dramatic speed, US professor Barry Popkin told the annual conference of the International Association of Agricultural Economists on Monday.
"The reality is that globally far more obesity than undernutrition exists," Popkin said, adding that while hunger was slowly declining, obesity was rapidly spreading.
There are more than a billion overweight people in the world and 800 million who are undernourished, he said at the Gold Coast convention centre near Brisbane. The world population is estimated at about 6.5 billion.
"Obesity is the norm globally and undernutrition, while still important in a few countries and in targeted populations in many others, is no longer the dominant disease."
The "burden of obesity", with its related illnesses, was also shifting from the rich to the poor, not only in urban but in rural areas around the world, he said.
China typified the changes, with a major shift in diet from cereals to animal products and vegetable oils accompanied by a decline in physical work, more motorised transport and more television viewing.
But all countries had failed to address the obesity "boom", the University of North Carolina professor said.
Food prices could be used to manipulate people's diets and tilt them towards healthier options, he suggested.
"For instance, if we charge money for every calorie of soft drink and fruit drink that was consumed, people would consume less of it.
"If we subsidise fruit and vegetable production, people would consume more of it and we would have a healthier diet."
University of Minnesota professor Benjamin Senauer used a comparative study of lifestyles in the United States and Japan to show how the costs of food and transport play a role in the problem.
Japan has one of the world's lowest rates of obesity and the US one of the highest.
"The average Japanese household spends almost a quarter of its income on food compared to under 14 percent in the US," Senauer said.
While a direct tax on food in the US to reduce obesity would not be politically acceptable, agricultural subsidies which resulted in cheap food could be reduced.
But other factors such as exercise also played an important role and again economic influences were involved, he said.
"Japanese cities are based on efficient public transport -- and walking. The average American commutes to work, drives to the supermarket and does as little walking as possible."
The average Japanese man walks four miles (6.4 kilometres) a day while almost a quarter of US adults may only walk between 1,000 and 3,000 steps a day, Senauer said.
While the relative cost of calories and fat had decreased over time, technology had eliminated much of the need for physical activity during work.
For most Americans, getting enough physical activity now required a conscious commitment to exercise and often cost money, such as the price of a round of golf or membership of a gym."
"Obesity and overweight bring with them significant risks of chronic disease and premature death and adjusting domestic policy to encourage a less sedentary lifestyle is literally a matter of life and death," he told the conference.
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I added the emphasis near the end there. I know that the lower cost of calories and fat and increased availability coincide with rise of technology and the decline in physical activity, but I have a hard time accepting a statment like 'now that I have to
think about it and it actually
costs money (
!), I don't know, this whole exercising thing is just really hard to accept!' It is preposterous to me because eating food also costs money and requires us to think about it - in fact, about three times a day on average. This reminds me of that health insurance thread a while back (I'll have to go searching for it and post it here later) where somebody asked why people routinely choose to spend their time and money getting things like ipods and expensive laptop upgrades rather than purchasing health insurance. As simplistic as it is to say this, why don't people think more? Why is thinking such an unpleasant activity?
Aside from that, I wonder what people think and actually
do when they read something like this (and please enlighten me by replying). I've been reading stuff like this -- about the growing percentage of obese people in the world, or even specifically in the U.S. -- for years and years now. For me, it's usually a reminder to start eating healthier again, or to get my butt outside to exercise more. When I had to take the President's Physical Fitness test in the 5th grade, the entire faculty and staff of my elementary school spouted a bunch of 'encouragement' for my whole class along the lines of 'America is getting too fat and the best thing you can do for your future is to be fit now!' On any given day, you are confronted with lots of conflicting information about this issue, even just in two aisles of the grocery store. You can find dozens upon dozens of boxes of cereal telling you how healthy and nutritious they are, and then you usually have to go all the way down to one end of the store to see a bunch of leafy greens and small bags of carrots with pictures of bunnies on them. I wonder how many people subconsciously forget that carrots and leafy greens are good and too many simple carbohydrates coated in sugar are bad. Perhaps it's time to tell the produce providers that they need to start advertising better?
What do you think the issue is?