2008-2009 POF: more than 90% of the population eat few fruits, vegetables and greens
July 28, 2011 10h00 AM | Last Updated: September 11, 2018 04h23 PM
The Brazilian population’s food consumption combines the traditional diet based on rice and beans with food with few nutrients and a lot of calories. The daily ingestion of fruits, vegetables and greens is below the levels recommended by the Ministry of Health (400g) for more than 90% of the population. Conversely, beverages with sugar added (juices, fruit drinks and soft drinks) are consumed twice as much, especially by teenagers. They ingest the double of the quantity ingested by adults and elderly and frequently consume cookies, sausages, mortadella, sandwiches and snacks, eating less beans, salad and greens.
The ingestion of some components of a healthy diet, such as rice, beans, fresh fish and cassava flour, decreases as the per capita family income increases. In opposition, the consumption of pizza, fried snacks, sweets and soft drinks rises. The ingestion of fruits, vegetables and diet/light dairy products also increases in this income range.
In the rural area, the averages of daily individual consumption are bigger for rice, beans, fresh fish, sweet potato, cassava flour and mango, among others. On the other hand, in the urban area, the highlights are soft drinks, bread, beer, pizza and filled cookies. The average consumption of calories out of the house corresponds to approximately 16% of the total caloric ingestion and it is bigger in the urban areas, in the Southeast region, among men and those with the highest per capita family income.
Considering the predominance of consumption inadequacies (percentage of people that ingest a certain nutrient in a level below the daily need or above the recommended limit), the highlights are excess of saturated fat and sugar (82% and 61% of the population, respectively) and insufficient fibers (68% of the population).
That and further information is available in the study “Analysis of the Personal Food Consumption in Brazil”, conducted in partnership with the Ministry of Health, a publication of the 2008-2009 Consumer Expenditure Survey (POF). In order to undertake the study, data about individual food digestion were collected from residents aged 10 or over, distributed in the 13.569 households selected from the original sample of the 2008-2009 POF, which covered 55,970 households. For the first time, data on food digestion outside the house were captured.
In addition to these results, IBGE publishes other two products from the 2008-2009 POF: the “Table of Reported Measures for the Food Consumed in Brazil”, which presents the measures reported by respondents as to consumed servings and their quantities in grams; and “Tables of the Nutritional Composition of Food Consumed in Brazil”. Those tables were largely used to elaborate the presented results.
The complete publication can be accessed at
The “Tables of the Nutritional Composition of Food Consumed in Brazil” are available at https://www.ibge.gov.br/home/estatistica/populacao/condicaodevida/pof/2008_2009_composicao_nutricional/default.shtm
And the “Table of Reported Measures for the Food Consumed in Brazil” is available at
https://www.ibge.gov.br/home/estatistica/populacao/condicaodevida/pof/2008_2009_medidas/default.shtm
It is also possible to generate dynamic graphs based on the data of the survey at:
Rural population consumes more grains, fruits and fish
In the classification that considers the situation of the household, the per capita daily consumption averages in the rural area were higher than those in the urban area for several groups of food. The highlights were rice (181.2g against 156.2g), beans (208.1g against 177.9g), fresh fish (53.5g against 17.5g) and cassava flour (19.1g against 4.7g), mango (10.7g against 3.5g), açaí (6.8g against 2.2g) and sweet potato (4.3g against 2.1g).
On the other hand, in the urban area, the highlights were:
soft drinks (10.5g against 42.7g), salt bread (56.9 against 33.4g), beer (33.8g against 17.5g) and sandwiches (13.5g against 2.2g).
Fresh fish is a highlight in the North region, corn products, in Northeast and tea, in South
Among the regions, Central-West records the highest consumption of rice (195.4g), beef (88.1g) and whole milk (45.4g).
Beans is a highlight in Central-West (206.2g) and Southeast (218.1g) and sweet potato in Southeast (23.2g) and in South (18.6g). The consumption of tea is higher in the South region (147.6g). In Northeast, the highlights are corn and corn products (50.9g) and green beans or cowpea (22.0g), which is almost not cited in the other regions. In North, three products, which register a very low or inexistent consumption in the other regions of Brazil, stand out: fresh fish and related products (95.0g), cassava flour (46.2g) and açaí (28.4g).
In relation to the percentage of consumption out of the household, the consumption of French fries was much higher (72.2%) in Northeast than in the other regions.
The consumption of pasta out of the household was four times higher in Central-West (27.9%) than in North (7.6%). In South, the highlight was other fish products (69.5%), bread, cakes and diet/light cookies (48.3%) and cured pork sausage (27.0%) In North, 91.5% of beer and 96.2% of processed snacks were consumed out of the household, the same happened to 72.6% of the wine in Northeast.
Consumption of cheese and raw salad increases with age
The consumption frequency of several types of food decreases with age:
yogurts, sausages, ice creams, soft drinks, juices/fruit drinks/powdered juices, milk drinks, cookies, sandwiches, snacks and processed snacks. The daily consumption of filled cookies is quite higher among teenagers (12.3g) than among adults (3.2g) and elderly (0.6g). Conversely, teenagers recorded a lower per capita daily consumption of raw salads (8.8g) than adults (16.4g) and elderly (15.4g). Regarding cheese, teenagers ingest 3.8g/day, while elderly ingest 9.2g/day. As for beer, the consumption for teenagers was of 3.3g/day, for adults, 41.3g/day and for elderly, it fell again to 19.8g/dia.
Consumption of greens, fruits and low-fat milk increases with income
The daily consumption of several items considered part of a healthy and balanced diet decreases as the per capita family income increases. This is the case of rice, which recorded a daily ingestion of 168.1g in the families with a per capita income up to R$296 and registered a fall to 129.7g in the families with a per capita income above R$ 1,089. The same happens to beans, with 195.5g and 127.5g, respectively.
Conversely, the consumption of several fruits and greens increases with the income, for example, banana (15.4g and 24.8g), apple (5.9g and 18.3 g), raw salad (7.9g and 21.8) and tomato (3.7g and 10.0g).
The same occurs with low-fat milk (1.8g and 9.4g).
Some types of food that point to inadequate diet also increase with the income such as milk-based sweets (4.8g and 7.6g), soft drinks (54.3g and 135.1g), pizza (0.7g and 11.0g) and fried and baked snacks (6.3g and 16.6g).
Teenagers have the highest daily averages for the ingestion of sugar and cholesterol
The average energy consumption of the Brazilian population changed from 1,490kcal to 2,289kcal.
The highest averages of energy ingestion were registered among men aged 14 to 18 years (2,289kcal/day). The second group with the highest energy ingestion were men aged 19 to 59 years (2,163kcal/day). For both sexes, the lowest values of energy ingestion were registered in the 60-or-over age group: 1,490kcal/day for women and 1,796kcal/day for men.
Lipids (fats) account for 28% of the dietary energy among teenagers and 27% among adults and elderly.
The percentage of proteins changed from 15% to 16% for teenagers and 16% to 17% among adults and elderly, above the recommended values of the Ministry of Health (from 10% to 15%). The contribution of carbohydrates among men changed from 54.8% (from 19 to 59 years of age) to 57.0% (from 10 to 13) and, for women, from 56.2% to 57.6% (same age groups).
The cholesterol ingestion daily averages were lower for women (from 186.3 mg to 237.9 mg) than for men (from 231.1 mg to 282.1 mg) in all age groups.
The group aged 14 to 18 registered the highest averages of cholesterol consumption. The ingestion of fibers was higher among men (from 20.4g to 23.5g) than among women (from 17.6g to 18.8g).
The average daily ingestion of total sugars changed according to age groups. The highest rates were among teenagers, from 105.4g to 113.1g among boys and from 106.8g to 110.7g among girls.
The average daily consumption of total sugars among teenagers was about 30% higher than among elderly and 15% to 18% higher than among men.
North registers the highest consumption of energy, ingestion of cholesterol and fiber
North registered the highest averages of daily energy ingestion, which changed from 1660kcal to 2496kcal.
The lowest averages were observed in Northeast, which changed from 1448 kcal to 2289 kcal.
In relation to the contribution of proteins to the total daily calories, the North region is also a highlight.
The limit of 15% for the total daily calories from proteins is also surpassed in all age groups in Northeast.
South and Southeast registered the lowest daily averages for the ingestion of cholesterol.
Conversely, North recorded the highest values of consumption.
For the different types of fat (fatty acid, saturated, monounsaturated and trans fats), the highlights were South and Southeast as those regions that registered the highest averages of ingestion.
As to the contribution of sugars to the total daily calories, the maximum limit of 10% was surpassed in all regions.
South and Southeast recorded the highest contributions of total sugars to the total daily calories. The highlight was that teenage girls accounted for 26% of that contribution. The lowest contribution, 13.4%, came from North among male elderly.
The average daily consumption of fibers presented the highest values in North and Northeast, with results that changed from 18.2g to 25.8g, in the case of North, and from 17.7g to 24.5g for Southeast.
The recommended carbohydrate contribution, 55% to 75% of the total daily calorie consumption, was observed in all regions, with a few exceptions.
Th lowest contribution, 52.3%, was estimated for men aged 60 or over in Central-West.
Low consumption of calcium and high consumption of sodium registered for all age groups
By analyzing the consumption inadequacies (the percentage of people that consume a certain substance above or below the recommended limits), some data about children and teenagers draw attention.
In the 10-to-13 age group, 96.4% of the teenage boys and 97.2% of the teenage girls recorded an ingestion of calcium below the minimum value recommended (1,100mg); the same happened with vitamin D (10mcg) for 99.4% of boys and 99.0% of girls; and with vitamin E (9mcg), for 99.2% and 99.8%, respectively.
The ingestion of sodium above the maximum daily limit for this group (2,200mg) was registered for 81.5% of the boys and 77.7% of the girls.
In the 14-to-18 group, the inadequate daily consumption of calcium (below 1,100mg) was recorded for 95.1% of the teenage boys and 97.3% of the teenage girls; of vitamin D (below 10mcg), for 99.4% and 98.8%; and of vitamin E (less than 12mcg), for 99.9% and 100%, respectively.
The excessive daily consumption of sodium for this age group (above 2,300mg) was registered for 88.9% of males and 72.9% of females.
In the 19-to-59 age group, the highest daily consumption inadequacies came from vitamin D (less than 10mcg), which reached 99.6% of men and 99.2% of women, and vitamin E (less than 12mcg), which reached 99% and 100%, respectively.
Conversely, the daily insufficient consumption of calcium (less than 800mg for men of that group and women up to 50 years of age and less than 1,000mg for women from 51 to 59 years of age) reached 83.8% of men, 90.7% of women up to 59 years of age and 96.7% of the women from 51 to 59 years of age. The excessive daily consumption of sodium (above 2,300mg) was recorded for 88.7% of men and 69.7% of women.
In the 60-or-over age group, the inadequate consumption of vitamin E (less than 12mcg/day) was 100% prevalent for both sexes.
Conversely, vitamin D reached 99.6% of men and 99.4% of women. In the case of calcium, the minimum limits are of 800mg for men up to 70 years of age and of 1,000mg above this age and, for women, of 1.000mg for the whole group. The prevalence of inadequate consumption in the group reached 85.9% of men up to 70 years, 94.3% of men above this age and 95.8% of women. Conversely, the daily ingestion of sodium above the limit of 2,300mg reached 80.4% of men and 62.2% of women.