People in India Eat Twice as Many Calories Per Day As I Do

"Americans eat an average of 3,770 calories per capita a day, the highest amount in the world, according to data from the UN Food and Agricultural Organization, compared to 2,440 calories in India."

Via Drudge

NEW DELHI: Instead of blaming India and other developing nations for the rise in food prices, Americans should rethink their energy policy and go on a diet, say a growing number of politicians, economists and academics here.

Criticism of the United States has ballooned in India recently, particularly after the Bush administration seemed to blame India's increasing middle class and prosperity for rising food prices. Critics from India seem to be asking one underlying question: "Why do Americans think they deserve to eat more than Indians?"

The food problem has "clearly" been created by Americans, who are eating 50 percent more calories than the average person in India, said Pradeep Mehta, the secretary general of CUTS Center for International Trade, Economics and Environment, a private economic research organization based in India with offices in Kenya, Zambia, Vietnam and Britain.

This is quite the Blame the US article, but c'mon, we aren't "hogging all the food". Food shortages have a lot more to do with the Corn crisis, because let's face it, we've been piling our plate here for a good 15 years. The big difference is that we have a market for high calorie food, India does not.

Can we and should we make some changes? Heck yeah. I made the change in 1992 and lost 45 pounds. It was habit based. Now, even with weightlifiting, I'm averaging 1300 calories a day. So shouldn't the writers of the above article be preaching even lower calorie diets? Who decides what's appropriate?