The Consumption of Milk in China

Mar 31
07:41

2011

Judy He

Judy He

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Great importance has been attached to milk these days. As we know, there is much nutrition in milk. Except for usual ingredients like water, fat, proteins and minerals, there are more than 100 other types of nutrition. For example, every 100 grams of milk contain 3.3 grams of proteins, 120 milligrams of calcium, 5 grams of carbohydrates, and 0.2 milligrams of niacin.

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Great importance has been attached to milk these days. As we know,The Consumption of Milk in China  Articles there is much nutrition in milk. Except for usual ingredients like water, fat, proteins and minerals, there are more than 100 other types of nutrition. For example, every 100 grams of milk contain 3.3 grams of proteins, 120 milligrams of calcium, 5 grams of carbohydrates, and 0.2 milligrams of niacin.

Winston Churchill, the former prime minister of Britain, once said, “No investment is more important than providing milk for schoolchildren,” when he talked about the European reconstruction after the Second World War. During the same period, Japanese advocated that a cup of milk could strengthen a nation. And similarly, there was a movement called “three cups of milk” in American history. Today, milk and dairy food are indispensable for western families. The consumption of dairy food in China is gradually increasing. But quite a number of Chinese people do not form the habit of drinking milk regularly, especially people from the countryside. Some people think the price of milk is still so high that they are not able to drink it from now and then. Milk is not available in some suburbs of China. With the improvement of the quality of life, the dairy food market will be more mature and larger in scale. There is no doubt that China is the most potential market throughout the world.

At present, the personal annual consumption of dairy food in the world is 100 kilos. But it is 6 kilos for Chinese people. This phenomenon is closely related with the Chinese eating habits. A survey has showed that 80% of Chinese families do not drink milk regularly. 20% never drink milk at all. Some parents said their children did not drink milk often after they were grown up. They chose to supply nutrition by eating health care products. The unawareness of the importance of milk directly leads to lack of calcium ingestion. WHO recommended us to ingest 800 to 1,200 milligrams of calcium a day but there are only 400 milligrams in Chinese diet. As a result, sever disease such as rachitis and osteoporosis caused by lack of calcium are more frequent in China. To change and improve the situation, we have to teach our children to strengthen their awareness of drinking milk and eating dairy food.

Luckily, in recent years, with the improvement of life quality and awareness of health, and influenced by the advocating of media, people have gradually noticed the value of milk. More and more families drink milk and eat dairy food on purpose. Milk is sold out quickly in the supermarkets. Experts from IDF estimate that in the following five years, the consumption of dairy food will increase more rapidly, with a raise of 15%.