Why is it so Easy to be Thin in Japan?

If you’ve ever been Japan, you may have noticed that it’s really hard to find an obese Japanese person. In the United States, it’s quite a different story. The rate of obesity among adults in America is on average around 30% whereas the Japan obesity rate is only 3.5%. But what makes the weight of people in these two countries so different? "Why Japanese people?" Let’s focus on a very simple yet key point about Japan.

The food environment is drastically different from the US. As of 2017 there’s over 243,000 Fast food establishments in America. There are only 6,169 establishments in Japan, meaning per person, there’s about 15 times more fast-food restaurants in America. Then again, in Japan, fast food, fried food, chips, chocolate, candy, soda, and not so healthy things are still available wherever you go. But there’s a huge variety of equally convenient reasonably healthy food. Let’s say I’m the average busy person in the states who would like to be healthy but doesn’t have time to cook at home. What’s for breakfast? Most people’s options are limited to things like a Mc Griddle with Hashbrowns and coffee, or maybe an Egg and processed Cheese sandwich with tater tots at Dunkin’ Donuts, or some pancakes at Denny’s if you have more time.

Surely some people have more healthy options, but what most people are going to have access to. So, what’s a quick breakfast in Japan? While there’s more than 6000 fast food establishments in Japan, there’s also 5000 "rice bowl" establishments. The big ones are Yoshinoya, Sukiya and Matsuya. And for 4 dollars at Sukiya, for breakfast you can get Plain Rice, Miso Soup with Seaweed, an Egg, baked fish, and a small potato salad comes with it. If you are extra hungry maybe you add some kimchi, fermented soybeans and stewed beef for 4 more dollars. Or, you can put together a reasonably healthy meal from a convenience store.

At a Japanese convenience store you can get a rice ball which is just rice, salmon and salt… a small salad, or a package of sushi, or a thing of fish with miso… Or some soup. You will be pretty impressed with how little junk is in this: it’s basically just vegetables, pork and fish broth. And, there’s a bunch of different foods like this. Compare that to what’s available in American convenience stores - they’re limited to fried foods sitting under heat lamps or foods loaded with trans-fat, sugar, preservatives and unhealthy additives.

If you’re lucky you might be able to get a package of plain nuts with nothing added. So, the items in Japanese convenience stores are not top-quality health foods, but they’re not bad. This is big because practically everyone has access to these places, convenience stores like these are everywhere. Japan has about 55,000 convenience stores meaning there’s about 10 times more convenience stores per square kilometer in Japan compared to America. For most, these places are in walking distance. Of course, there are healthy restaurants here and there in America and you can make a really healthy meal with ingredients from the supermarket.

But when it comes to cheap, convenient and quick food - it’s almost always quite unhealthy. In Japan, for a quick lunch, you can go to burger king, or right next door you can get some sushi. You can get a Hamburger and some Popcorn at Vandalism Cafe, or you can go next door to Matsuya and get a bowl of spicy tofu soup with a bit of beef, green onion and cabbage, some pork, a soft-boiled egg, some mustard spinach, rice and there’s free pickled ginger to go with it. And of course, there are many healthier non-chain places that offer many different types of cuisine.

And this variety is important. It’s going to be much easier to stick to healthier options if you aren’t getting bored of having to eat the same things at the same places over and over. Even if you’re going out to drink with friends at dinner time, there’s still a variety of good food choices. The standard place to drink at is an izakaya - at 10,000 establishments, there’s almost twice as many izakaya’s as there are fast food places in Japan. Replacing fast food for alcohol is not a good strategy, but let’s see what one of the common izakaya chains have to offer in the way of food. Most Japanese people wouldn’t think of these places as “healthy”. But this isn’t about optimal health. Just means to point out that even someone who puts minimal effort into being healthy can get some reasonable quality meals out of these very convenient places. By the way, what’s everyone drinking with and between meals?

In America, more often than not it’s soda, considering a survey of 80 countries found that America comes in at rank #1 for soda consumption at 170 liters purchased per person in 2011. Japan came in at rank #56 at 32 liters per person. In Japan most places serve tea with your meal for free and in general it’s harder to purchase massive quantities of soda - there’s no comically large big gulps at seven eleven. Japan has the smallest “large” cup size at McDonald’s - An American medium size drink is bigger than a Japanese large.

Another factor to thank for keeping people’s soda intake low is again: variety. What’s interesting is despite Japan drinking 5 times less soda than America, soda is available in vending machines everywhere in Japan. There’s 5.52 million vending machines, meaning there is a vending machine for every 23 people in Japan - that’s the highest vending machine per capita on the planet. So, what’s in these vending machines? Among other things, they have black coffee, six different types of unsweetened tea and water. A typical American vending machine offers 13 varieties of drink, the only non-sweet one being water. So, convenience and variety - simple, but it makes a difference. It’s easier to pick the healthy choices when they are just as easy and convenient as the unhealthier choices.