{"id":17422,"date":"2021-05-21T10:00:41","date_gmt":"2021-05-21T14:00:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.vrg.org\/blog\/?p=17422"},"modified":"2021-05-11T12:19:10","modified_gmt":"2021-05-11T16:19:10","slug":"do-you-eat-close-to-17-pounds-of-carrots-a-year","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.vrg.org\/blog\/2021\/05\/21\/do-you-eat-close-to-17-pounds-of-carrots-a-year\/","title":{"rendered":"Do You Eat Close to 17 Pounds of Carrots a Year?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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By Reed Mangels, PhD, RD<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If you\u2019ve ever wondered if your vegetable consumption is\nsimilar to that of the average American, you will enjoy scrolling through\nreports from the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA). The USDA keeps\nrecords of how much food is available each year, on average, for each person in\nthe United States. They do this by tracking domestic production, initial\ninventories, and imports of a particular food (for example broccoli) and then\nsubtracting exports and end-of-year inventories. The national supply is divided\nby the U.S. population to calculate an estimate of food availability per\nperson. While these estimates of food availability cannot tell us how much of a\nfood an individual person eats, they provide an estimate of what is available\nfor the average American individual. These estimates can be used to identify\ntrends in food production.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The most recent report looks at the years 2000 to 2019. The\npart of the report that examines vegetables shows that over these two decades, the\ntotal amount of vegetables available decreased by 4 percent from 417.4 pounds\nper capita to 400.1 pounds. These totals include fresh, frozen, canned, and\ndried forms of vegetables.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The largest increase in vegetable availability was in the\nred and orange subgroup which includes sweet potatoes, chile peppers, and bell\npeppers. In 2019, 49 pounds of these foods were available per capita, compared\nto 35.1 pounds in 2000. Dark green vegetable availability also increased going\nfrom 21.7 pounds per capita in 2000 to 27.5 pounds in 2019. This subgroup\nincludes broccoli, kale, spinach, and romaine and leaf lettuce.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

More legumes were available in 2019 \u2013 11.1 pounds per capita\ncompared to 8.5 pounds per capita in 2000.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s encouraging to see that more red and orange and dark\ngreen vegetables and legumes are available since these are important sources of\nnutrients such as vitamin A, vitamin C, iron, and zinc.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Other vegetables with greater availability over the past 20\nyears include<\/p>\n\n\n\n