Experts from the National Institute for Nutrition agreed in a recent seminar that Vietnamese people are becoming over-weight due to consuming too much meat.
Obesity fears
At a recent seminar on the issue, Doctor Le Doanh Tuyen, Vice Director of the National Institute for Nutrition said that while malnutrition among children was still a headache, they were also having to cope with a rising number of overweighed children.
He revealed that more than 5% of children of below-five years old are overweight, with 2.8% described as obese. The average rate in cities is even higher at 6.5%.
According to Doctor Do Thi Ngoc Diep, Director of HCM City’s Nutrition Centre, one quarter of primary students in the city are overweight. “This condition used to be more common among middle-aged people but now the number of overweight children is rising sharply, there’s been an 85% increase compared to a decade ago.
Director of the National Institute for Nutrition, Le Thi Hop also said that about 460,000 children under five nation-wide were overweight or obese and the number was rising at an alarming rate, especially in HCM City and Hanoi.
The number of overweight adult people is also high. A survey carried out by the institute in 2010 showed that 7.8% of men aged between 54-59 are overweight, while the rate among women was 10.7%.
A lesson from some countries
The recent changes in daily diets are considered the main reason for increased obesity.
According to a report from the institute, Vietnamese people’s daily meals have changed significantly over the past decade. Rice now only accounts for 66.4% of the daily intake (a decrease of nearly 20%) while meat, eggs and milk make up 25% (increase by 17%).
Doctor Le Doanh Tuyen said that Vietnamese people are consuming more meat and less fish. “During the 1091 – 1985 period, a person consumed an average amount of 11.1 grams of meat a day and this had increased fivefold by 2000 and eightfold by 2010. Meanwhile, the average amount of fish consumed by a person during the 1981-1985 period was 35 grams a day, increasing to 45.5 grams by 2000 and double that by 2010.
Nutritional experts also blamed local’s tastes for more fast-food, canned food and less rice and vegetables.
“The average amount of meat consumed in Vietnam is still comparatively low (less than 30 kilos per year) compared to 54.2kg in China, 84kg in America, and 109.9kg in Australia,” Tuyen said.
“Experts from some countries with high obesity rates have warned that we should see their problem as a lesson and try to control the situation before it is too late.”
Tuyen also encouraged people to follow Japanese and Korean diets and add more fish and less meat to their meals.