Meat is always on the menu in many parts of the world, as we can see when we map out meat consumption by country. How do countries differ in how much, and what type of meat, they eat? In this colorful graphic, we highlight the most consumed type of meat in every country in the world, using data from the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO).
Each colour denotes a different category of meat - beef, pork, mutton, poultry, seafood, or other with annual consumption calculated per capita in kilograms (kg).
Let’s dig into the data.
Is Fish Considered Meat?
Since meat is normally defined as the flesh of any animal (with the primary components being water, fat, and protein), that includes fish and other seafood.
But whether fish is considered “meat” or not depends a lot on cultural practices and dietary preferences, and has varied throughout history. Some earlier definitions of meat focused only on mammals, for example.
In Christianity for example, many denominations allow eating fish on fasting days when abstaining from meat. This was both due to distinctions between meat from warm-blooded land animals and cold-blooded animals (like fish), as well as the importance of fish consumption in parts of Europe where Christianity flourished.
To account for both sides of the debate, we’ll cover meat consumption by country both with and without fish and seafood.
Just by glancing at the map, poultry stands out as the most popular meat by weight consumption in 70 countries, or about 40% of the entire database.
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