Healthy Restaurants in Hong Kong Are Pretty Much Nonexistent, Survey Reveals

August 23, 2016

Hong Kong is not the kind of city you visit to eat healthy food, according to a recent survey.

Polytechnic University surveyed 401 residents and 305 restaurants in Hong Kong and found that 60% of restaurants didn’t offer enough healthy food options, according to SCMP.

Healthy foods and dishes are considered to be vegetarian or low in salt, oil and sugar.

Sixty-five percent of people between the ages of 15 and 59 who responded to the survey eat out four or more days each week while over 30% eat out every day.

The majority (60%) of restaurants surveyed claimed to provide healthy foods and dishes in the form of side dishes of vegetables or toast.

Warren Wong Kin-pong, the study’s lead researcher at Polytechnic University’s Department of Applied Social Sciences, explained:

“This indirectly discourages customers from ordering healthy food, as dishes are not included in a set, which increases costs and time for the customer.”

The study also found that most people surveyed below the age of 30 choose the price of the food over how healthy it is while people over 60 choose health over price.

However, 60% of those surveyed that finding healthy food in Hong Kong is still challenging, especially for the elderly.

The survey concluded with a recommendation for the Food and Environmental Hygiene Department to enforce guidelines for restaurants to not only provide more healthy options for customers but to also to make it easier for the elderly to locate healthy restaurants.

Chung Kim-wah, the director at the Centre for Social Policy Studies at Polytechnic University, said:

“Hongkongers have the awareness to eat healthy. But one-hour lunch breaks and long queues test their determination to do so.”

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