S. Korea’s diet foods see sales surge amid pandemic

길어지는 코로나에 배달음식 '주춤'•다이어트식 '불티'The COVID-19 pandemic is changing the way people eat.Following a steep surge in food delivery services, …sales of diet items have seen a steady rise amid the prolonged outbreak.Park Se-young tells us more.Konjac is a low-calorie, high-fiber root vegetable grown in Asia.This fried rice product made with rice and rice-shaped konjac just needs to be heated up, …and has about half the calories of steamed rice.Such products have become popular as the prolonged COVID-19 outbreak has got more people caring about their weight.According to food company data, sales of konjac rice products increased by more than 60 percent in March compared to the previous month. “Sales have increased dramatically as of February. It seems that customers enjoying home meal replacements have bought them amid the prolonged coronavirus outbreak.”One grocery delivery platform saw 13 times as many sales of its diet lunch boxes as it had seen the year before.Meanwhile, the popularity of high-calorie delivery foods has been slumping.Major fried chicken franchises say delivery sales, which were on the rise until February and March started to slow down in May. “At the start of the COVID-19 outbreak, people refrained from going out and ordered a lot of delivery food but the prolonged outbreak has got people thinking more about their health.”In accordance with such trends, the industry is working to launch easy-to-eat diet products.Park Se-young, Arirang News.