Healthy Bytes

Japan - what’s on the plate?

read time: about two minutes

The CBS Sunday Morning show this past week also featured a segment on Japan. Japan holds the distinction of the highest life expectancy in the world for both men and women.

Since we’re always looking for that metaphorical magic pill, a lot of attention over the past few years has been given to soy. We now have soy everything… and most of the soy in the US is genetically modified.

Soy is one thing the Japanese were eating that Americans weren’t.
But the Japanese weren’t/aren’t eating huge amounts of soy. And that certainly isn’t the only difference in diets.

The diet in Japan is primarily fresh and local veggies, small to moderate amount of animal protein - generally fish, less often poultry and meat - and whole grains. What does this diet lack?… processing.

As pointed out in the CBS Sunday Morning show segment most kitchens in Japan don’t have an oven… they don’t consume a lot of grains.
Things are changing with younger Japanese. Those golden arches are all over the world. And now disease is on the rise in Japan - obesity, diabetes, heart disease.

Currently about 24% of Japanese 15 years and older are overweight… compared to 65% in the US.

“Westernize” the diet… pack on the pounds.

Again (and again), it’s better to eat the diet of your ancestors (and “seniors” in Japan), than the diet advocated by the food conglomerates and fast food industry.

This entry was posted on Tue, 24.Oct.2006 at 7:44 am and is filed under Nutrition, Lifestyle. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.