02 January 2014

Protein

Can you guess which country in Southeast Asia has the highest daily intake of protein per person? The surprising answer is Myanmar; but Brunei is not far behind.

Below is from a table extracted from page 9 of a recent ODI report ranking the countries in Southeast Asia by how much the daily intake of protein per person exceeds 50 grams, which is the recommended intake for a moderately active adult. (It is not entirely clear why Singapore is omitted from this list.)

This table suggests that Bruneians are consuming about 33 grams of protein more than they should every day, which is rather alarming, indicating a huge health problem in the future. But I guess we already knew that.

Of course, it is not as bad as some countries, particularly the USA, Mexico, Kuwait, Belgium, the UK, and New Zealand. But it is still rather worrying.