IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/bla/agecon/v56y2025i3p349-359.html

Healthy and Sustainable Diets in China and Their Global Implications

Author

Listed:
  • Yumei Zhang
  • Jingjing Wang
  • Shenggen Fan

Abstract

Current diets in China and worldwide are neither healthy nor sustainable. This paper addresses this challenge focusing on China, which has experienced a rapid dietary transition in recent decades. We investigate how China can improve both health and environmental outcomes by adopting healthy and sustainable diets through a literature review and a food system modeling exercise. We further analyze how policy interventions, including both supply‐ and consumer‐side strategies, can promote the transition toward such diets. The findings provide valuable lessons for other countries facing comparable challenges.

Suggested Citation

  • Yumei Zhang & Jingjing Wang & Shenggen Fan, 2025. "Healthy and Sustainable Diets in China and Their Global Implications," Agricultural Economics, International Association of Agricultural Economists, vol. 56(3), pages 349-359, May.
    • Handle: RePEc:bla:agecon:v:56:y:2025:i:3:p:349-359
    DOI: 10.1111/agec.70020
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1111/agec.70020
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1111/agec.70020?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Hunt Allcott & Benjamin B Lockwood & Dmitry Taubinsky, 2019. "Regressive Sin Taxes, with an Application to the Optimal Soda Tax," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 134(3), pages 1557-1626.
    2. Tian, Xu & Lin, Faqin, 2023. "Trade liberalization and nutrition transition: Evidence from China," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 51(C).
    3. David Tilman & Michael Clark, 2014. "Global diets link environmental sustainability and human health," Nature, Nature, vol. 515(7528), pages 518-522, November.
    4. Amelia B. Finaret & William A. Masters, 2019. "Beyond Calories: The New Economics of Nutrition," Annual Review of Resource Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 11(1), pages 237-259, October.
    5. Bai, Junfei & Seale Jr, James L. & Wahl, Thomas I., . "Meat demand in China: to include or not to include meat away from home?," Australian Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society, vol. 64(01).
    6. Fangfang Sheng & Jingjing Wang & Kevin Z. Chen & Shenggen Fan & Haixiu Gao, 2021. "Changing Chinese Diets to Achieve a Win–Win Solution for Health and the Environment," China & World Economy, Institute of World Economics and Politics, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, vol. 29(6), pages 34-52, November.
    7. Dithmer, Jan & Abdulai, Awudu, 2017. "Does trade openness contribute to food security? A dynamic panel analysis," Food Policy, Elsevier, vol. 69(C), pages 218-230.
    8. Shenggen Fan & Yuchen Zhu & Xiangming Fang, 2023. "Big Food Vision and Food Security in China," Agricultural & Rural Studies, SCC Press, vol. 1(1), June.
    9. Romain Cadario & Pierre Chandon, 2020. "Which Healthy Eating Nudges Work Best? A Meta-Analysis of Field Experiments," Marketing Science, INFORMS, vol. 39(3), pages 465-486, May.
    10. Marco Springmann & Michael Clark & Daniel Mason-D’Croz & Keith Wiebe & Benjamin Leon Bodirsky & Luis Lassaletta & Wim Vries & Sonja J. Vermeulen & Mario Herrero & Kimberly M. Carlson & Malin Jonell & , 2018. "Options for keeping the food system within environmental limits," Nature, Nature, vol. 562(7728), pages 519-525, October.
    11. Junfei Bai & James L. Seale & Thomas I. Wahl, 2020. "Meat demand in China: to include or not to include meat away from home?," Australian Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society, vol. 64(1), pages 150-170, January.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Matin Qaim & Martin C. Parlasca, 2025. "Agricultural Economics and the Transformation Toward Sustainable Agri‐Food Systems," Agricultural Economics, International Association of Agricultural Economists, vol. 56(3), pages 327-335, May.
    2. Yaowen Xu & Qian Li & Youhan Wang & Na Zhang & Julin Li & Kun Zeng & Liangsong Wang, 2025. "Dynamic Evolution and Driving Mechanisms of Cultivated Land Non-Agriculturalization in Sichuan Province," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 17(19), pages 1-25, September.
    3. Yuxuan Wang & Ze Tian & Xiaodong Jing & Mengyao Li, 2025. "Development Dynamics and Influencing Factors of China’s Agricultural Green Ecological Efficiency Based on an Evaluation Model Incorporating Ecosystem Service Value and Carbon Emissions," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 17(18), pages 1-31, September.
    4. Long, Wenjin & Meng, Ting & Tian, Xu & Fan, Shenggen, 2025. "China’s food security and food system governance: recent developments and global implications," Food Policy, Elsevier, vol. 137(C).

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Irene Blanco-Gutiérrez & Consuelo Varela-Ortega & Rhys Manners, 2020. "Evaluating Animal-Based Foods and Plant-Based Alternatives Using Multi-Criteria and SWOT Analyses," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 17(21), pages 1-26, October.
    2. Birgit Kopainsky & Anita Frehner & Adrian Müller, 2020. "Sustainable and healthy diets: Synergies and trade‐offs in Switzerland," Systems Research and Behavioral Science, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 37(6), pages 908-927, November.
    3. Elke Stehfest & Willem-Jan Zeist & Hugo Valin & Petr Havlik & Alexander Popp & Page Kyle & Andrzej Tabeau & Daniel Mason-D’Croz & Tomoko Hasegawa & Benjamin L. Bodirsky & Katherine Calvin & Jonathan C, 2019. "Key determinants of global land-use projections," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 10(1), pages 1-10, December.
    4. Bauer, Jan M. & Aarestrup, Simon C. & Hansen, Pelle G. & Reisch, Lucia A., 2022. "Nudging more sustainable grocery purchases: Behavioural innovations in a supermarket setting," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 179(C).
    5. Campi, Mercedes & Dueñas, Marco & Fagiolo, Giorgio, 2021. "Specialization in food production affects global food security and food systems sustainability," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 141(C).
    6. Gale, Fred & Dong, Fengxia, 2023. "China’s Meat Consumption: Growth Potential," Economic Research Report 338955, United States Department of Agriculture, Economic Research Service.
    7. Huaqing Wu & Zhao Zhang & Jialu Xu & Jie Song & Jichong Han & Jing Zhang & Qinghang Mei & Fei Cheng & Huimin Zhuang & Shaokun Li, 2025. "Food consumption away from home had divergent impacts on diet nutrition quality across urban and rural China," Food Security: The Science, Sociology and Economics of Food Production and Access to Food, Springer;The International Society for Plant Pathology, vol. 17(1), pages 41-56, February.
    8. Wu, L. & Harris, P. & Misselbrook, T.H. & Lee, M.R.F., 2022. "Simulating grazing beef and sheep systems," Agricultural Systems, Elsevier, vol. 195(C).
    9. Karolina Pawlak & Walenty Poczta, 2024. "Twenty Years of Poland’s EU Membership: What Is Progress in the Agri-Food Sector?," Agriculture, MDPI, vol. 15(1), pages 1-24, December.
    10. Khoiriyah, Nikmatul & Forgenie, David & Sookhai, Satesh & Saputro, Arief Joko, 2024. "Demand Elasticities of Animal-Sourced Food: Empirical Study in Yogyakarta, Indonesia," International Journal of Food and Agricultural Economics (IJFAEC), Alanya Alaaddin Keykubat University, Department of Economics and Finance, vol. 12(3), July.
    11. Louis-Georges Soler & Alban Thomas, 2020. "Is there a win–win scenario with increased beef quality and reduced consumption?," Review of Agricultural, Food and Environmental Studies, INRA Department of Economics, vol. 101(1), pages 91-116.
    12. Benjamin Leon Bodirsky & Jan Philipp Dietrich & Eleonora Martinelli & Antonia Stenstad & Prajal Pradhan & Sabine Gabrysch & Abhijeet Mishra & Isabelle Weindl & Chantal Le Mouël & Susanne Rolinski & La, 2020. "The ongoing nutrition transition thwarts long-term targets for food security, public health and environmental protection," Post-Print hal-03030437, HAL.
    13. Yosuke Shigetomi & Asuka Ishigami & Yin Long & Andrew Chapman, 2024. "Curbing household food waste and associated climate change impacts in an ageing society," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 15(1), pages 1-11, December.
    14. Confidence Duku & Carlos Alho & Rik Leemans & Annemarie Groot, "undated". "IFAD Research Series 72: Climate change and food system activities - a review of emission trends, climate impacts and the effects of dietary change," IFAD Research Series 320722, International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD).
    15. Shi, Shanheng & Zhou, Shiwei & Lei, Yongdeng & Harrison, Matthew Tom & Liu, Ke & Chen, Fu & Yin, Xiaogang, 2024. "Burgeoning food demand outpaces sustainable water supply in China," Agricultural Water Management, Elsevier, vol. 301(C).
    16. Xiaoyu Liu & Liangjie Xin, 2024. "A more plant-based diet can boost public health and reduce environmental impact in China," Food Security: The Science, Sociology and Economics of Food Production and Access to Food, Springer;The International Society for Plant Pathology, vol. 16(2), pages 411-422, April.
    17. Franziska Funke & Linus Mattauch & Inge van den Bijgaart & H. Charles J. Godfray & Cameron Hepburn & David Klenert & Marco Springmann & Nicolas Treich, 2022. "Toward Optimal Meat Pricing: Is It Time to Tax Meat Consumption?," Review of Environmental Economics and Policy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 16(2), pages 219-240.
    18. Amelie Griesoph & Stefan Hoffmann & Christine Merk & Katrin Rehdanz & Ulrich Schmidt, 2021. "Guess What …?—How Guessed Norms Nudge Climate-Friendly Food Choices in Real-Life Settings," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(15), pages 1-18, August.
    19. Agyapong, Nana Ama & Annan, Reginald A. & Apprey, Charles & Aryeetey, Richmond, 2022. "A review of Ghana’s food system and its implications on sustainability and the development of national food-based dietary guidelines," African Journal of Food, Agriculture, Nutrition and Development (AJFAND), African Journal of Food, Agriculture, Nutrition and Development (AJFAND), vol. 22(02).
    20. Perino, Grischa & Schwirplies, Claudia, 2022. "Meaty arguments and fishy effects: Field experimental evidence on the impact of reasons to reduce meat consumption," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 114(C).

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:bla:agecon:v:56:y:2025:i:3:p:349-359. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/iaaeeea.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.