I began to think about why Americans are becoming increasingly overweight, trying to figure out what, if anything makes us so much worse than the rest of the world. Unfortunately, I do not think that the world can blame Americans as a group for getting fat; through the expansion of the fast food industry, it can be seen that Americans' weight issues should not be labelled as Americans'. Humanity as a whole would eat until they could hold no more and do nothing, if they could.
Businesses move where there is a market. That is basic and simple economics. So why, if populations such as the Chinese are so against the American-based food industry, do they provide a market? Many times it has been said that Americans are imposing their food on the world, and their weight problems as well, but that simply isn't possible. If Americans were the only group who liked fast food, then here it would stay. But it hasn't; fast food is a global phenomenon that people can't seem to resist.
Fast food is cheap and accessible. In countries such as China, where many people are poor, fast food could give them access to food. However, if this were a valid argument, a person would have to realize that China's poor is not in an urban setting where all the McDonald's are. China's poor labor in the rice paddies, scrape by in the countryside for the most part.
If someone wanted to make a change with fast food, the only feasible way to do it would be consumer education. Let them know exactly what is - and isn't - in that Big Mac. Show them healthier options. But before American do-gooders go trapising across the globe, they should start in their own nation, where people think that if they have some salad with their Big Mac or chili, it's all good.
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