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A century ago, most humans had dull, monotonous diets. They consumed mostly grain. People ate less vegetables than today, and little meat or fruit. In France in 1900, the average person ate 723 pounds of bread per year — about two pounds per day, leaving little room for anything else. But that is changing. Today, people eat more meat, fruit, and vegetables. The average French person now eats only 128 pounds of bread per year, while consuming 187 pounds of meat, 115 pounds of potatoes, 20 pounds of carrots, and 55 pounds of apples (the average European eats about 34 pounds of apples per year).

People also used to consume fewer calories. In the 1700’s and early 1800’s, the average person in France consumed less than 2,000 calories per day, compared to over 3,000 calories today. In the 1950s, the average person in China or Vietnam consumed less than 2,000 calories per day, compared to over 3,000 calories today.

“For almost all of human history, food was scarce for nearly everyone. The reason for this perpetual scarcity was that whenever food production increased, it did not lead to more food per capita but to more people,” notes Our World in Data:

Food production did not increase per capita. Population pressure ensured that living standards remained only barely above the subsistence level. Economic historians refer to this mechanism as the Malthusian Trap….This changed in the last decades. More and more societies around the world broke out of the Malthusian Trap. We see this in the data as increasing food production in per capita terms. The chart shows that farmers have grown many fruits, vegetables, and nuts faster than the world population has increased.

Fruit and vegetables have become a bigger part of people’s diet over the last 60 years in most of the world. In 1961, the average person on Earth consumed only 20 pounds of tomatoes per year. In 2022, the average person consumed 50 pounds of tomatoes (in things such as pizza, salads, sauces, and fresh tomatoes). In 1961, the average person ate only 10 ounces of strawberries per year. In 2022, the average person ate about 3 pounds of strawberries per year. In 1961, the average person ate 13 pounds of watermelon per year. In 2022, the average person ate 29 pounds of watermelon. In 1961, the average person ate less than 7 pounds of cucumbers per year. In 2022, the average person ate 26 pounds of cucumbers per year.