Wikipedia:Changing Food Consumption in China

Changing Food Consumption in China (2000-2020)
China is the country with the largest population in the world with over one billion residents. As a result, large shifts in the consumption of food in China have large impacts across the world as China houses such a large part of the world's population. This has happened over the last couple centuries as China has had a rapidly growing economy in the last three decades. This rapid rise in the economy has brought about a huge shift in food consumption in China. This can be seen in multiple ways. One of these prominent indicators of this huge shift is the fact that China's grocery market is predicted to become the largest in the world in 2023 overtaking the US market.

However, along with these large and rapid shifts in the food consumption of people in China come large implications for such a rapid changes in a population that is so large. One large implication that has been rising along with the increasing food consumption in China has been how to meet this increased demand from a population of over one billion residents. While China is a large country, it does not have enough fertile land to meet the increasing demands of its one billion residents. Because of this, China's domestic production is unable to keep up with the increased demand for food as the economy has risen. As a result, China has been forced to turn to other sources to meet these increasing demands by relying more and more on foreign food imports and foreign food markets. This can be seen as China's foreign food imports have grown from just $14 billion to $104.6 billion between 2003 and 2017. As a result, the changing food consumption in China from the 2000s to the 2020s has introduced problems in how to supply this growing demand as it is only expected to increase in the future.

There are also various other implications such as addressing the economic consequences of the changing food consumption in China from its cultural and lifestyle changes to the economic impact that these rapid shifts continue to bring. The changing food consumption in China not only has had huge impacts on the global markets to meet this demand demand and the huge shift and changes in the culture around food consumption in China, but also has had many controversies and challenges that have arisen because of it.

Background
Under the rule of Mao Zedong, China had been living in an era of economic stagnation. This can be seen as china was in extreme poverty in the 1980s with about two thirds of its population living under the poverty line. It was in 1978 in this economic climate in China when Deng Xiaoping took office and initiated a huge economic reform. Under state controlled capitalism Deng made massive market reforms in sectors like agriculture, education, industry and science. With so much of China living in poverty, Deng took the opportunities he had to improve the economic state of China prioritizing the money that it brought into the country over the methods used to achieve them. This is exemplified in a quote by Deng where he says, "What does it matter if it is a ginger cat or a black cat as ling as it catches mice?" As long as people and China were able to get their hands on the money needed to lift a large portion of its people out of poverty, the methods mattered much less. These large shifts in economic practices brought along a great boom in China's economy greatly increasing the amount of income in China and rapidly changed the people living in China's lives forever. In terms of lifting people out of poverty, these market reforms have been largely successful as only around 0.5% of the population in China currently lives under the poverty line. These huge shifts in economy and income have greatly shifted food consumption in China since the 1980s bringing large changes in what and how people in China eat.

Rising Income
China's fast economic and income growth is a key contributing factor into raising consumer income in China. As consumer income increased, so did the demand for higher quality foods such as meats in contrast to previously consumed lower quality grains. Increased income in China is correlated with rises in food with protein, saturated fat and cholesterol. With increasing wages comes a shift away from more staple foods that are cheap and filling like rice and other grains to foods that are more expensive with more protein, saturated fat and cholesterol like meats. This trend can be seen in China as particular products such as poultry, dairy and fish products have seen a rise with increased income in China while other food products like grain have not shifted as much in quantity with rising income. The drastic rise in consumer income over the past couple of centuries has brought about huge shifts in consumption as well as increased spending money usually results in the purchase of more quality products and an increased quantity of food.

Rapid Urbanization
Urbanization in China has risen at a rapid pace as only 20% of China's population lived in cities in 1970 but climbed to almost 50% in 2010. This huge shift from more rural living to more urban living has been driven in large part by a mass migration of people leaving towns on the countryside to seek out opportunities in cities while China has a huge economic boom. As a result, much of this mass migration has been a result from the economic incentives of living in an urban environment as working in a job in the city brings much higher wages compared to farming in rural areas as much of the population had done before. Because of this strong incentive to migrate from rural areas to live in cities, urbanization in China is expected to continue to grow with the prediction that in 2030, 1 billion people in China will live in cities. This rapid urbanization in China has not only been recent and sudden but is also expected to continue to grow as the economic incentives continue to push many people out from rural life into cities. This rapid urbanization has not only brought about rising incomes in China but moving from an urban area can influence lifestyles which alter food consumption. Changes in lifestyle occur in those that move from rural areas to more urban ones. This impact can be seen with changes in food choices and consumption as people who migrate from rural areas to urban ones decrease grain and vegetable consumption while the consumption of animal products tends to increase. With urbanization only expected to continue to increase in the coming future, China's food consumption will likely increase along with it and continue to change the culture of eating and consumption in China as the diet shifts from food like vegetables and grains to produce like dairy and meats. Looking at the current trend, this shift seems unlikely to change and seems likely to continue to grow in the coming future.

Processed Foods
The rising income coupled with the rapid rise in urbanization has shifted and promoted changes in lifestyles in China. Food has shifted away from traditional home-cooked meals to more processed foods that are easier, quicker, and cheaper to prepare and consume. As people in China have increasing options as a result of increased consumer income from jobs in urban areas, there are shifts in the lifestyle around food and food consumption. One of these lifestyle shifts is apparent when income shifts from the middle class to upper class as when this happens there becomes a spike in the consumption of processed foods. Not only can processed foods be cheaper and more accessible, they are convenient and save a lot of time in day-to-day life. As people transition to jobs in urban areas, extreme work cultures such as "996" leave less time to go home and cook traditional meals. With dwindling time and demanding work, the shift to more convenient processed food increases. As a result, this shift to processed or semi-processed food is a response to an increased desire for more convenient and time saving methods has caused a shift in lifestyles. With the business of a job in an urban area and the increased income that comes from a working job, shifts towards processed food are on the trend of continuing to increase in China.

Fast Food
These changing lifestyle choices have also aided the rise of a recent phenomena, fast food consumption in China. This introduction of fast food in China represents a shifted away from traditional diets to more Westernized ones. This has not only been a result of busier lifestyles that favor quicker and cheaper fast foods but also a changing culture and lifestyle within China that is interested in consuming Western-style fast food. Fast food is not only seen as a convenient way to eat food, it has also become something of a symbol of achieving a sense of modernity as well as an inclusion in to more of a global culture. This perception in China of fast food from a product into a culture and symbol of trendiness and wealth has greatly shifted lifestyles about food and changes consumption in China.

One population that fast food culture in China has greatly impacted are children. With increased income in the hands of many parents as well as the increase in consumerism in China for products like fast food, children end up having increased spending power as well as they are given money from their parents. As a result, this market of Western-style fast food has not only found an appeal in adults living in urban areas but has also found a huge appeal in children in China. This can be seen in the phenomena of some children of wealthy Chinese families that has been coined the "Little Emperor Syndrome." Families with money in urban cities excessively shower single children with attention and money which often results in the large consumption of fast food like Kentucky Fried Chicken and McDonalds. This shift in children's food consumption lifestyle will likely have lasting impacts on the coming generations of children raised in China in areas such as obesity.

Eating Out
Another lifestyle change that has followed rising income and increasing urbanization is the increased prevalence of dining out or eating food away from home. The demand for food in China has rapidly increased as lifestyles shift from homemade meals to eating out. The convenience and lifestyle associated with eating food outside of the house is prevalent in more urban areas in China. However, this increase may have negative consequences as food consumed outside of the home is related to poorer diets with increased energy, protein, carbohydrate, fat, and iron intake. Changes like increased eating out have shifted the lifestyles of people living in urban areas. This is also a reflection of the emerging middle and upper class in China as the ratio of eating food away from home to eating food cooked at home increases in favor for eating away from home as income grows. This is especially true for those who earn the highest incomes with the ratio of food expenditures used on eating away from home only increasing as time goes on.

Changing tastes and preferences
As China opened up to foreign markets and incomes rose to give consumers in China more buying power, food tastes and preferences evolved with it. People were able to access a wider variety of foods available in markets and the increasing cultural exchanges around the world gave people in China more exposure to food and beverages outside of China. This combined with the increased spending power made for a cultural shift in people's tastes and preferences. This was reflected not only the interest in eating Western-style fast food and shift from traditional Chinese meals to eating processed food, eating food outside of the home, and the increased consumption of animal based products like meat and dairy, but also in foreign products that are considered more "quality" to Chinese consumers. The association of foreign products with increased quality have opened up a new preference and taste for overseas food products like wines, chocolates and other luxury goods. This has shifted from food as simply a staple for eating but also as an indicator of being trendy, status and a signal to others about what tastes and preferences a person has in China. This represents not only a change in food preference and taste but also a shift in lifestyles and the culture and messaging around food consumption.

Food Production
In order to meet the changing demands for food and food consumption in China, strategies for food production need to change. One method that China has turned towards is technological advancements and improving agriculture production and operations. China spends billions of dollars on improving agriculture research from water systems to developing farming systems that yield a higher supply of crops. China has also invested a lot of time and effort into cooperating with other countries through initiatives like South-South(SS) and Triangular Cooperation (TrC). These types of initiatives work to have developing countries collaborate on building international infrastructure and global trade. These investments in these areas by China show the high priority China places on developing its agricultural production and systems with increasing money and time put into these kinds of projects and initiative. This investment in overseas relationships with other countries is also representative of China's efforts to meet agricultural demands for its people by relying on foreign trade. Through these changes, food production has greatly shifted in response to changing food consumption and changing demand in China. In turn, the infrastructure and improved operations results in a better food production system that is able to grow to help China meet its own domestic demand for food.

Marketing
The boom of marketing and advertising was not present in China until more recently as in the 1980s there were barely any ads present in China. As China experienced a huge amount of growth over the next decades, the amount of money people could use to spend on products grew opening up the path to a huge market in advertising. This can be seen now as China is the second biggest advertising market, only second to the United States of America. This dramatic increase in marketing and advertising has not only created more exposure to various products but has helped aid the growing culture and lifestyle around buying products. Instead of eating food to fill your stomach, eating specific types or brands of food now signal something about the person. This shift in marketing has influenced Chinese food consumption as it can be seen with certain types of fast food have certain perceptions associated with them like being trendy or modern.

Population Structure
The changing population structure in China has influenced food consumption in a multitude of ways. A result of actions like the One Child policy, starting in the 1980s and ending in 2015, as well as other factors like the declining birth rate in China in the past couple of years, the demographics of China's population have continued to shift. These shifts have resulted in a population in China that steadily gets outnumbered by the elderly while the younger population continues to shrink. The proportion of people who are older continues to grow while the proportion of the population that is young continues to drop making China have higher and higher proportions of an older population as the years go by. This shift in population demographics will likely play a role in food consumption in China in the future and have effects on the lifestyles and culture surrounding food consumption.

Obesity
The rapid changes in food consumption has drastically impacted the kinds of diets that people in China have. With the increased prevalence of eating fast food, processed food and food away from the home the landscape of food consumption has had side effects on the health impacts these changes are associated with. One large impact that has caused a lot of discussion is how many of these changing food consumption habits like eating more meat and dairy products as well as the other changes listed above are associated with less healthy diets. As a result, these shifts in food consumption are thought to be some of the potential reasons for the rise of obesity in China that have been rising at rapid rates in recent decades. An increasing amount of people in China are becoming more obese with major Chinese cities hosting some of the highest rates of overweight or obese populations. In cities like Shanghai and Beijing the over half of the residents are obese or overweight highlighting the rapid emergence of an obesity epidemic in China. While the economic boom in China increasing income and urbanization in China, China has not only welcomed the positive changes that come with increased consumer spending power but the negatives like the dietary impacts of the food that becomes popular or more readily consumed. While China opened up to global markets to address the rising food demands domestically, it also opened the door to advertising and unhealthier eating options such as processed foods that have been thought to be a key contributing factor into the current obesity epidemic in China. While these changes have solved some of the problems China is facing it has also introduced a new set of problems that need to be addressed in return.

Food Waste
In a country that spends increasing amounts of money its agricultural developments and meeting the demands of domestic food consumption, it is also a country that generates a large amount of food waste each year. Every year China loses around six percent of the food that it produces to food waste with most of this food waste coming from areas like food retail and consumption. Furthermore, China is the country with the second most percent of the population undernourished. However, China has managed to make huge steps in addressing this problem by greatly reducing its undernourishment in the part few decades. In 2000 16.2% of the population was considered undernourished which fell to 8.6% in 2017 according to the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO). This shift from food scarcity to increased consumption has been driven by a multitude of factors and represents a shift of food consumption in the country and the large changes that continue to occur in China.

The national emphasis on agriculture as well as the undernourished population China have brought controversy over the amount of food that is wasted in China every year. As consumption of food increases in China, so has the food waste. One of the contributing factors to food waste is the deeply rooted culture of buying excessive amounts of food when eating out as a show of hospitality to their guests. To do so is to show etiquette to the guest and also a sign of the person's wealth. This results in people that go out to eat ordering much more food then people are ever expected to consume resulting large amounts of food waste. This encourages food waste as the more food that is left uneaten after an outing, the more the host is viewed as hospitable which leads to large amounts of unneeded food waste. Other contributing cultural factors that lead to increased food waste are the emergence of popular social media trends such as "Mukbang" have influencers film themselves binge-eating excessive amounts of food with the more food consumed often getting the most attention and praise. These emerging trends have also shown an emerging culture of food consumption that continues to fuel food waste. However, the government has noted these controversies and problems and has attempted to implement laws and policies aimed at reducing food waste in China

Environmental Impacts on the Climate Crisis
The increase in consumption and the dietary changes that China has gone has had serious environmental impacts on the climate crisis. The problem of satisfying the huge food consumption demand in China is creates a huge sustainability challenge in learning how to meet this demand while also trying to mitigate its impact on the climate crisis. China's increased demand in animal products such as meats and dairy only continue to grow while these agricultural sectors are a huge contributor to greenhouse gas emissions in the world as well as the destruction of the environment through water pollution and the loss of biodiversity. The current approach to meeting domestic food consumption demands in China prioritizes the economic growth and financial incentives of supplying these demands over the devastating environmental impacts that these actions cause. The problem is only expected to increase as the food demand in China is only expected to continue to increase in the years to come.

China is the country that emits the most greenhouse gases in the world with the total emitted being greater than all of the developed worlds combined. This has made China a focus for reducing greenhouse gas emissions with China pledging to reach net-zero emissions by 2060 with a total emissions peak in 2030. However, if China expects to reach this goal in reducing its greenhouse gas emissions, it must also focus on addressing the environmental impacts of the food system in China. Over fourteen percent of China's greenhouse gas emissions come from China's agriculture and food sectors showing that these issues need to be addressed if China wants to meet its goals in 2060.

Food Safety and Trust
As food consumption and demand has rapidly ramped up in China in the past couple of decades, so has the production of products and goods made in China. However, in order to meet this rising demand while also cutting the costs of production to make more profit, China has been flooded with substandard products that are faked as genuine, quality products. This coupled with the lack of regulations and enforcement from the government have created consumer anxiety from not being able to trust the products that they buy in fears that they are fake. This has had major consequences as some substandard products have become prevalent in areas that can have lasting consequences from permanent disabilities to even death. More broadly, the effects of these production methods can lead to severe health consequences and have created a consumer anxiety culture within China in which people are unable to trust the products that they consume domestically. It has permeated culture so far that foreign brands are considered more trustworthy and high quality compared to domestic Chinese brands and trust in domestic products has permeated through everyday purchases in China. Increasing food consumption and the profits to be made from selling to those with rising incomes in China has incentivized people to take advantage of the situation to make money by selling fake or substandard food products. As a result, consumer trust in China has been deeply impacted and has shifted the attitude around domestic food brands in China and attitudes towards food products.

Chinese Milk Scandal
One of the biggest scandals of this food safety was the "big head baby" scandal where infant milk powder was adulterated with melamine and made with poor quality milk. Some babies that had drank this adulterated milk were born with extremely large heads and had also resulted in the malnutrition of a. lot of babies in China. With rising incomes, people in China had greatly increased their intake of dairy products like milk and was widely consumed in China at the time and as a result, had greatly shocked the nation when the scandal broke in 2004. This scandal greatly hurt the trust and credibility of domestic milk products is one of the large moments that reflected the growing mistrust of food products in China. The government did respond to these scandals with crackdowns but it is suspected that little has changed to actually prevent the production and dispersion of substandard and fake milk products. This can be shown as another milk scandal emerged only four years later in 2008 when poor quality milk powder was adulterated with melanin to pass protein quality checks. This resulted in hundreds of adults and babies hospitalized along and even resulted in the deaths of six infants.