Trend of milk consumption among Chinese children and adolescents aged 7 to 17 years old in 9 provinces from 1991 to 2006

Abstract

To investigate the trend of milk consumption among Chinese children and adolescents in 9 provinces from 1991 to 2006. The paper was based on data collected in the China Health and Nutrition Survey in 1991, 1993, 1997, 2000, 2004, 2006 and the subjects aged 7 to 17 years old with complete 24-hour-dietary data for 3 days. Milk consumption in this paper was defined as intake of fresh milk, powdered milk or yogurt, excluding other milk products and milk drinks. There were increasing trends of milk drinking rate and average amount of milk consumption per day in the period of 1991 - 2006, in which milk drinking rate among Chinese children and adolescents increased from 2.88% in 1991 to 13.88% in 2006. The average milk consumption per day increased from 3.90 g/day in 1991 to 26.11 g/day in 2006. There were significant differences regarding milk consumption, both on regional and economic levels. Although milk intake had been increasing in the past 15 years, there was still huge gap between the amount of consumption and the criterion of 300 g/day, proposed by the Chinese Dietary Guidelines (2007). The prevalence of dietary calcium intake under Adequate Intake value was still over 97%, indicating the need of more efforts to be made. The condition of milk intake was improved significantly from 1991 to 2006. However, there was widespread deficiency in milk consumption among Chinese children and adolescents, calling for strengthening the macro-control, optimizing the production and conducting education on nutrition, and improving milk consumption among the Chinese children and adolescents.