Lifestyles of the rich and shameless
Japanese can be humorous and deadly serious at the same time. The latest drive by Japanese lawmakers to fine - on a per head basis - companies whose workers' waistlines exceed the 'legal' limits have provided many amusing stories for news media around the world. Weight-loss groups, many organised by blue-chip companies, sprang up like mushrooms, with participants with problematic waistlines singing inspirational slimming songs while exercising in the office together.
Yet, the purpose behind the legally- sanctioned campaign cannot be more serious. With a rapidly ageing population, obesity in the country is expected to cause more cases of chronic diseases such as diabetes and heart disease in coming decades. It is, indeed, a time bomb that needs to be addressed, even though it does not have the urgency of a terrorist attack or an outbreak of a deadly disease.
The same time bomb is ticking among many urbanites and their children in the more affluent mainland provinces, yet Chinese are showing, by and large, the opposite response as Japanese. Having obese children is a sign of wealth; so is eating fatty dairy-based food. Developing a sweet tooth for chocolate and ice cream - and making it a life-long habit - does not help matters either, in a country where many people are supposedly lactose-intolerant.
China's battle of the bulge is not yet comparable to Japan's or the United States'. For one, malnutrition is still a threat in the poorest rural areas. In this, there is not one China, but many parts, only some of which have problems with obesity, usually in the wealthier coastal urban provinces.
There are still worrying trends though. According to a 2005 Asian Development Bank study, 200 million Chinese adults were overweight in 2002, double the number of a decade before. That number can only have risen in the past six years. Chinese are consuming more beef and dairy products, more sugar and fast food than ever before. The rate of breast cancer in China used to be a fifth of that in the US, but it is projected to rise quickly in coming decades.
Beijing's economic planners have often been credited for creatively learning from other countries' mistakes while reforming the economy. However, Chinese, as a society, have been woefully inadequate in dealing with social and health crises.
In this, they should learn a thing or two from Japan, one of the few contemporary societies in recent history that has been exemplary at coping with medium- and long- term threats that may not eventuate years or even decades down the road. After the two oil shocks of the 1970s, Japan has turned itself into one of the world's most energy- efficient nations.
Today, Japan's fuel-efficient vehicles, energy-saving buildings and low-energy consumption patterns have put it in a much better position than many others to deal with the current third oil shock that is seeing prices per barrel going past US$140. In contrast, China's affluent class today regard driving a gas guzzler as a badge of honour, at a time when even Americans are shunning sports utility vehicles. Some 14,000 new cars hit the country's roads each day. In today's China, conspicuous and ostentatious consumption is unrestrained by an appropriate sense of moral or social decorum.
Creating wealth is one thing; making it sustainable is another. Chinese make a big deal out of being able to pass on wealth to the next generation. But collectively, what we have shown is that wealth and its distasteful display not only threaten to perpetuate class warfare but create an energy-wasting and unhealthy lifestyle that will mortgage our children's future.
As US academic Jared Diamond has argued in his best-selling book Collapse, few societies throughout history managed to deal with long-term threats until it was too late. As the problems of obesity and energy-inefficiency have shown, China is in danger of proving to be no exception.
Alex Lo is a senior writer at the Post
