Fat China

All signs point to a China that will see more dieting fads, nutritional analyses, over-processed foods, and rising rates of unhealthy consumption. Like any other people in the world, the Chinese like their fats and oils and sugars, they like the convenience and taste of fast food, and they organize their family and social lives around a hearty meal. The main differentiating factor between China and the West, however, is its sole attention on academic and financial success (often inversely related to the amount of time spent being physically active). This Shenzhen Undercover blog post cites some interesting statistics on China's health, suggesting a convergence with the American diet. I, for one, would not like to see Chinese (or any population of the world) deal with the social, psychological, and health-related consequences of obesity. When coupled with the increasing exposure to the glitz and glam of fashion/celebrity/model world, I cringe at the imminent reality.

The even more dreadful part of the story is that this is a trend that will disproportionately affect the poorer families in urban areas. (Those living in rural China do not yet have the income nor access to new dieting patterns.) There have been many debates on this topic arising from bans on fast food restaurants in several US cities, Cambridge, MA among them. The Becker-Posner blog points to lower cost and time-saving aspects of fast food that lure people to frequent those restaurants. Furthermore, though the comparative cost of fast food may not be much lower than buying produce and cooking (because much of what a customer pays at McDonald's pays for packaging and marketing), it is true that fresh, quality groceries are harder to come by in poorer neighborhoods. In China, this is less of a problem as many people still shop at morning markets and prefer traditional Chinese cuisine (many make the argument that the American diet is so unbalanced and over-processed is because it's not inherited from hundreds of years of successful adaptation to natural produce), though supermarket shopping is on the rise. However, due to the intense, singular focus on academic achievement--i.e. a sedentary lifestyle in which a child sits in classroom, has limited physical education, studies at multiple after-school programs, does hours of homework and tutoring on weekdays and weekends, and surfs the internet in their limited downtime--Chinese children on an unbalanced diet are more susceptible to obesity and related health problems. Affluent families have the wherewithal to pay for their children's tennis or swimming or golf lessons on top of their myriad educational costs; poor families do not. To aid those families and their children along, let's hope for the continued expansion of physical activity in cities with the rising popularity of pickup basketball and soccer games, better urban planning for parks and recreational areas, and more campaigns to alert Chinese of the dangers of unhealthy eating and living.

Linda Li, '09
lindali@fas.harvard.edu