Ideal weight now 5kg more: 65kg for men, 55kg for women

HYDERABAD: The National Institute of Nutrition (NIN) has added another 5kg to the ideal weight of Indians. While the weight of an ideal or reference Indian man was 60kg in 2010, it has now increased to 65kg. In case of women, it has gone up to 55kg from 50kg a decade ago.

Along with this, the earlier height for a reference Indian man was 5 feet 6 inches and a woman was 5 feet. It is now revised to 5 feet 8 inches for a man and 5 feet 3 inches for a woman. This will now be taken for normal body mass index. NIN scientists said this was because nutritional food intake had gone up. Also, data from rural and urban areas was taken into account this time as against only urban data 10 years ago.

A premier nutrition research body of the ICMR, NIN has also revised its recommended dietary allowance and estimated average requirement of nutrition for Indians in its 2020 report, released on Monday. The definition for reference Indian adult man and woman with regard to age was changed to 19-39 years instead of 20-39 years, which was fixed in 2010. The scientists added that a previous expert committee in 1989 had taken the body weight and height of only well-to-do Indian children and adolescents.

Data taken from all states unlike 2010 panel
Another expert panel in 2010 had taken nutrition profiles from only 10 states for computing reference body weights. Both committees had arrived at the reference weights for men and women at 60kg and 50kg.

Now, the 2020 panel took data from all over India, taking into account National Family Health Survey 4 (2015-16), National Nutrition Monitoring Bureau (2015-16), World Health Organisation (2006-07) and the Indian Academy of Paediatrics (2015) to derive the reference body weight values.

For the first time, the ICMR expert committee considered recommendations for fibre based energy intake. About 40grams per 2,000 kilo calories of food consumption has been considered as safe.

The visible fat intake for individuals with sedentary, moderate and heavy activity has been set at 25, 30 and 40 grams per day, respectively, for an adult man and 20, 25 and 30 grams per day, respectively, for an adult woman. It was common for men and women in the 2010 recommendations.

Also for the first time, recommendations have been made for dietary intakes of carbohydrates setting the estimated energy requirement at 100 grams per day for ages one year and above with a recommended dietary allowance of 130 grams per day.

Nutrient requirements, for the first time, include estimated average requirement and also the tolerable upper limit of nutrients along with recommended dietary allowance. While RDAs are daily dietary nutrient intake levels which would be sufficient to meet the requirements of nearly all healthy individuals, EARs are the average daily nutrient intake levels of the population.

The calcium requirement proposed as RDA for an adult man and an adult woman is 1,000mg per day. It was 600mg per day in 2010. For a lactating woman, an additional amount of 200mg is added. For post-menopausal woman, the recommendation is 1,200mg per day.