The obese population has surpassed one billion. Obesity and hunger. The world is still unfair.
【World’s Obese Population Surpasses One Billion, Children Four Times More Underweight, Japanese Women Pointed Out】
https://www.bbc.com/japanese/articles/cy9zyk89d71o
・The number of obese people in the world has surpassed one billion, according to a new study published in the journal The Lancet.
・The study, based on 2022 data, found that there are 880 million adults and 159 million children worldwide who are considered obese.
・Tonga and American Samoa have the highest rates of obesity among women, and American Samoa and Nauru among men.
・The availability of healthy and unhealthy foods is an issue in many of these island nations,” explained the professor.
・While the number of countries facing an obesity crisis has increased, the number of countries where underweight is the greatest concern has decreased. The percentage of adults classified as underweight has decreased by 50%. However, researchers stress that it remains a pressing issue, especially in the poorest communities.
・Japan (women only) was the only high-income country with a high prevalence of underweight in 2022.
・”Climate change, the impact of the new coronavirus pandemic, and the war in Ukraine risk exacerbating obesity and underweight rates by increasing poverty and raising the price of nutritious foods.”
・”The result is a chain reaction of food shortages in some countries and households and a shift to less healthy foods in others.”
The above is a quote from the article
Obesity and hunger. The world is still unfair.
It appears that the world’s obese population has exceeded one billion.
By the way,
【Hunger Population Increases by 122 Million Compared to 2019. Due to multiple crises = UN report.】
https://ja.wfp.org/news/122-million-more-people-pushed-hunger-2019-due-multiple-crises-reveals-un-report
In the year 2023, the reported number of people facing hunger in the world is 735 million. (2.4 billion people are moderately or severely food insecure without stable access to food)
One billion people are obese, 700 million are hungry, and 2.4 billion are food insecure.
As I mentioned above, it is not a simple picture of obesity because of affluence (disparity in access to unhealthy and healthy foods), though,
This balance is really strange.
【What is Japan’s food loss ranking in the world?】
https://www.tryeting.jp/column/8665/
Japan ranks 14th. It seems that each person discards 64 kg of food per year.
I understand that it is not a simple matter of distributing the waste to the rest of the world, as there are also raw foods, but I personally think that dry foods and other foods with long expiration dates should be collected more forcefully and distributed to the rest of the world.
As for water, a quarter of the world’s population still does not have access to safe drinking water.
When we watch world news on TV, it is always about big countries like the U.S., China, and Western European countries. Watching such news makes us feel as if we are watching the world, but in reality, this is not the case. When I come into contact with information such as the above, I am reminded of this.
As I have mentioned above, the world is still unfair.
In this unfair world, Japan (Japanese people), who are positioned at the top, should perhaps be a little more aware of this and more aware of the world. (It is easier for the people at the top to change the world than those at the bottom.)
Of course, we are not talking about a level where we can do something immediately.
First of all, I think it is important to “know” or “try to know” and to be interested first.
I think this can be said for other things as well. If you lose interest, that’s it. Nothing will change for the better.
Let’s be interested in both small perspectives and big perspectives such as this one.
See you then
【India: 40% of the population will not have access to safe drinking water in 7 years】
https://www.wateraid.org/jp/blogs/india-water-crisis-summer2023
Even that great country India is in this situation. Japan is truly blessed to have safe tap water available at all times. However, there is a trend to privatize such world-class tap water, and I am a little concerned about that.
