Food that is eaten routinely and considered a dominant portion of a standard diet
Various types of potatoesUnprocessed seeds of spelt, a historically important staple foodHarvesting Sago pith to produce the starch in Papua New Guinea
A staple food, food staple, or simply staple, is a food that is eaten often and in such quantities that it constitutes a dominant portion of a standard diet for an individual or a population group, supplying a large fraction of energy needs and generally forming a significant proportion of the intake of other nutrients as well.[1] For humans, a staple food of a specific society may be eaten as often as every day or every meal, and most people live on a diet based on just a small variety of food staples.[2] Specific staples vary from place to place, but typically are inexpensive or readily available foods that supply one or more of the macronutrients and micronutrients needed for survival and health: carbohydrates, proteins, fats, minerals, and vitamins.[1] Typical examples include grains (cereals and legumes), seeds, nuts and root vegetables (tubers and roots). Among them, cereals (rice, wheat, oat, maize, etc.), legumes (lentils and beans) and tubers (e.g. potato, taro and yam) account for about 90% of the world's food calorie intake.[1]
Early agriculturalcivilizations valued the crop foods that they established as staples because, in addition to providing necessary nutrition, they generally are suitable for storage over long periods of time without decay. Such nonperishable foods are the only possible staples during seasons of shortage, such as dry seasons or cold temperate winters, against which times harvests have been stored. During seasons of surplus, wider choices of foods may be available.
Generally, staple foods are plants, as meats are usually expensive and often fed using edible plants. Crops also tend to be more versatile, have greater nutrients, and do not spoil as quickly. Exceptions including herding in regions where the plants are inedible to humans, such as in Mongolia (sheep), the Sioux (bison), and the Sami people, (reindeer).[8][9][10]
Demographics
Food energy consumption per person, per day, worldwide
Average daily food energy (kcal) per person, 1979–1981
Average daily food energy (kcal) per person, 2001–2003
No data
<1600
1600–1800
1800–2000
2000–2200
2200–2400
2400–2600
2600–2800
2800–3000
3000–3200
3200–3400
3400–3600
>3600
Except for war-torn countries, the people of the world are getting more daily calories, despite a growing population globally.
The dominant staple foods in different parts of the world are a function of weather patterns, local terrain, farming constraints, acquired tastes and ecosystems. For example, the main energy source staples in the average African diet are cereals (46 percent), roots and tubers (20 percent) and animal products (7 percent). In Western Europe the main staples in the average diet are animal products (33 percent), cereals (26 percent), and roots and tubers (4 percent).
Most of the human population lives on a diet based on one or more of the following staples: cereals (rice, wheat, maize (corn), millet, and sorghum), roots and tubers (potatoes, cassava, yams and taro), and animal products such as meat, milk, eggs, cheese and fish. Regional staples include the plants rye, soybeans, barley, oats, and teff.
Just 15 plant crops provide 90 percent of the world's food energy intake (exclusive of meat), with rice, maize, and wheat comprising 2/3 of human food consumption. These three are the staples of about 80 percent of the world population,[11] and rice feeds almost half of humanity.
Roots and tubers, meanwhile, are important staples for over one billion people in the developing world, accounting for roughly 40 percent of the food eaten by half the population of sub-Saharan Africa. Roots and tubers are high in carbohydrates, calcium, and vitamin C, but low in protein. Cassava root, for example, is a major food staple in the developing world, a basic food source for around 500 million people.
With economic development and free trade, many countries have shifted away from low-nutrient-density staple foods to higher-nutrient-density staples, as well as towards greater meat consumption.
Most staple food is currently produced using modern, conventional farming practices. However, the production of staple food using organic farming methods is growing.
Ten staple foods of global importance (ranked by annual production)[15]
Rice is most commonly cooked and eaten as separate entire grains, but most other staple cereals are milled into a flour or meal that can be used to make bread, noodles, pasta, porridge and mushes like mealie pap (although both can be eaten either as grains or ground into flour). Root vegetables can be mashed and used to make porridge-like dishes such as poi and fufu. Pulses (such as chickpeas, from which gram flour is made) and starchy root vegetables (such as canna rhizomes) can also be made into flour.
Nutrition
Consumed in isolation, staple foods do not provide the full range of essential nutrients. The nutrient-deficiency disease pellagra is associated with a diet consisting primarily of maize, while the disease beriberi is associated with a diet of refined white rice.[21]Scurvy can result from a lack of vitamin C, also known as ascorbic acid. One author indicated that the nutritional value of some staple foods are negatively affected by higher levels of carbon dioxide, as occurs in climate change.[22]
Comparison of 10 staple foods
The following table shows the nutrient content of 10 major staple vegetable foods in raw form on a dry weight basis to account for their different water contents. Raw grains are not edible and cannot be digested, so must be cooked, sprouted, or otherwise prepared for human consumption. In sprouted and cooked form, the relative nutritional and anti-nutritional contents of each of these grains is different from that of the raw form of these grains, as shown. Potatoes also must be cooked, but should not be sprouted. The highlighted values show the highest nutrient density among these 10 staples. Other foods, consumed in smaller quantities, may have nutrient densities different from these values.
Nutrient content of 10 major staple foods per 100 g dry weight[23]
A raw yellow dent corn B raw unenriched long-grain white rice C raw hard red winter wheat D raw potato with flesh and skin E raw cassava F raw green soybeans G raw sweet potato H raw sorghum Y raw yam Z raw plantains /* unofficial
^ abcSu, Wen-Hao; He, Hong-Ju; Sun, Da-Wen (24 March 2017). "Non-Destructive and rapid evaluation of staple foods quality by using spectroscopic techniques: A review". Critical Reviews in Food Science and Nutrition. 57 (5): 1039–1051. doi:10.1080/10408398.2015.1082966. ISSN1040-8398. PMID26480047. S2CID40398017.