The number of vegetarians and vegans are rising. According to some studies, the approximate number of vegans are less than 1% of the world population. And based on the most recent United Nations estimates, the world population in 2022 will be 8.0 billion. Therefore, the total number of vegans in the world in 2022 will be approx 80 millions [1].
In addition, according to the data from Indonesian Vegetarian Society (IVS), 2019 was a vegan year, where vegan community started to develop in some countries. So since then, many world-class entrepreneurs have flocked to develop a vegetarian restaurant business [2]. This phenomenon is also confirmed by Diana Beauty, as a vegan enthusiast who lives in Indonesia.
“I think current environment have enough support for the lifestyle. So many new vegan restaurants opening up in big cities around Indonesia. And many restaurants provide vegan options/menu as well,” she said.
Thus, in order to know further about the developing of vegetarian and vegan lifestyles trend in Indonesia, in November 2022 Snapcart conducted a study with the results below.
From the infographic above we can see that the majority of people in Indonesia (77%) are familiar with the terms ‘vegetarian and vegan’. However, only 35% Indonesians who really understand about these lifestyles, as you can see in this graphic below.
Does price of products affect these lifestyles?
In society, sometimes we hear that vegetarian and vegan products are expensive. However, our study figured out some interesting facts.
Currently, among 2.378 samples, 11% of Indonesians which is dominated from SES lower are vegetarians or vegans. While 26% of them, which is dominated by SES upper have tried to be a vegetarian or vegan but decided to quit these lifestyles, mostly after they tried to do it for less than a year.
Furthermore, from the infographic we can see that price issue is not included among the top 5 reasons why people stopped doing these lifestyles. However, as a vegan for almost five years, Diana also added that products for vegans and vegetarians are indeed very affordable. But the cheap prices do not apply to certain types of food products that are sometimes consumed by vegetarians and vegans.
“Not all products are affordable. Depends on what you buy as well. If you stick to whole food it’s actually really affordable. The fancy ingredients are expensive like quinoa, seeds, etc,” said Diana.
The future of vegetarian and vegan lifestyles in Indonesia
Even though the number of vegetarians and vegans in Indonesia is still a few, but our research shows some intriguing facts about the development of these lifestyles.
Despite the fact that only 11% of Indonesians who are still loyal to be a vegetarian (dominated by male) and vegan (dominated by female) for mostly around 1-5 years to this day, but according to infographic above, almost half of the population (45%) of those who haven’t tried applying these lifestyles are interested to become a vegetarian or vegan one day.
Furthermore, although some of our respondents who have tried to become a vegetarian or vegan confessed that they do these lifestyles only for a diet (17%) or experiencing a new thing (3%), which might be last for a short period of time, but most of them (62%) said they tried these lifestyles because they want to be healthy and live longer, so it is possible for them to continue applying these lifestyles in the future.
Additionally, our study also found out that most people in Indonesia are getting used to consume various of vegetarian and vegan products such as food and beverage, beauty, even fashion products that don’t use any animal body parts as production materials, and only 31% of Indonesians who have never consumed those kind of products.
“I believe these lifestyles will be sustainable and will be adapted by more people in the near future. The fact that many industries are catering to these lifestyles shows growth in demand,” said Diana to Snapcart.
Interested to know further about consumers’ consumption trend? Contact us at partners@snapcart.global
Sources:
[1] https://thevou.com/lifestyle/how-many-vegans-are-in-the-world/
