Trading lost fat for beef

WUXI, China (AFP) — In a community center in eastern China, Shu Fangqiang shrugged off his jacket and stepped onto a scale, one of hundreds of locals signing up for an unusual weight loss program — “Trade Fat for Beef.”

The rules are straightforward: for every half kilogram he loses, Shu will receive the same weight in boneless beef, or 1.5 kilograms of beef on the bone.

Participants of the campaign in the city of Wuxi were weighed once in March, and will return in January 2027 for a second and final weigh-in.

They will then be rewarded with expensive cuts like oxtail if they lose more weight — though the total amount of free meat available is capped at 10 kilograms.

Organizers say more than 1,000 people have registered since the Wuxi campaign started in March — with thousands more turned away for not meeting local community residence requirements.

Queues for weigh-ins reached up to a dozen people at a time in both the men and women’s sections, an Agence France-Presse journalist saw.

At the front of the queues, participants stepped on weighing scales which displayed their height, weight and Body Mass Index.

Staff members then measured their waists, logged their data on a form.

The program is one of many springing up across China, backed by local authorities anxious to tackle rising obesity rates. As of 2021, there were 402 million overweight or obese adults over 25 in China, according to a study published in The Lancet.