South Koreans’ consumption of meat has jumped nine times over the past 45 years, but their intake of rice, a traditional staple food, has dwindled by half.

A report released on Monday by the National Agricultural Cooperative Federation(NACF), the research arm of Nonghyup, showed that South Koreans consumed an annual average of 47-point-six kilograms of meat last year, more than nine times the five-point-two kilograms measured in 1970.
 
South Koreans’ fruit consumption also jumped seven times during the same period, while consumption of vegetables and fishery products increased twofold and threefold, respectively.

In contrast, South Korea’s per-capita intake of rice amounted to 62-point-nine kilograms last year, down 54 percent from the 136-point-four kilograms tallied in 1970.

The NACF partly attributed the improvement of South Korean people's physical conditions to the increased consumption of livestock products.

However, it expressed concerns that the westernization of South Koreans' diet will raise the import of meat products and worsen the country’s declining food self-sufficiency. The NACF added that the country needs to find ways to encourage the public to consume more homegrown agricultural or livestock goods.