Doner nation: Scotland is takeaway capital

SCOTLAND has the highest percentage of independent takeaways in the whole of Britain, new figures have shown.

Health campaigners have warned that the proliferation of outlets such as burger bars and kebab shops, and a greater reliance on them during the financial downturn, means Scotland is becoming a "fatter nation".

The figures emerged from a survey by insurers Simply Business examining the changing composition of independent shops on Scotland's high streets.

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It showed that Scotland is top for takeaways with 6 per cent of high street shops selling fast food, compared with a UK average of 5 per cent.

The contrast is even greater in the country's two main cities. In Edinburgh and Glasgow fast food shops representing 7 per cent and 6 per cent of independent high street shops respectively.

Tam Fry of the National Obesity Forum said that he believed the current financial downturn would see the continued proliferation of takeaway shops in Scotland and exacerbate the country's already poor record on obesity.

"It may not be a big percentage, but the smell is incredible and it is the smell that gets people into these shops," he said. "You can walk down any high street and you will be drawn to the enticing smell of fish and chip shops, burger shops, whatever you want, and that is powerful.

"Unfortunately, the credit crunch is adding fuel to the fire. It is not for nothing that these shops are springing up all over the place because they are cheap and cheerful and they fill you up. Unfortunately, they will be filling you up with the wrong type of stuff, and they are going to be depended on increasingly by the sort of people who are unable to go out with cash in their pocket to buy good food. It's fair to say that the takings of these shops are going up and up."

Mr Fry said that Scotland had not seen the end of the proliferation of takeaway shops and that he believed the country would emerge from the current downturn less healthy than it went into it: "The writing is on the wall that we will be a fatter nation."

Paul Freathy, professor of retail management and chair of the institute for retail studies at Stirling University, said the prevalence of takeaway shops in Scotland also harked back to its industrial heritage.

"Parts of Scotland had a very working class culture and that reflects the tastes of tradition heavy manual labour industry," he said. "It's given rise to the fish and chip shops in the 40s, 50s and 60s, it was cheap, nutritious food and it was very reasonably priced. Plus, in the old days, so many people did manual work that there weren't any issues about obesity.

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"So to a certain extent it's remained very much in the Scottish psyche and part of Scottish consumption culture." Prof Freathy added that a takeaway meal still represented a "cost effective" way to provide a substantial meal for a family.

A recent study by a Medical Research Council (MRC) team has said that the high prevalence of takeaways in poorer areas may be one of the factors behind rising obesity, as they make unhealthy meals the easy choice for residents there.

The researchers said the fast-food focus in poor areas created an "obesogenic" environment and called on planners to consider the health of the local community when deciding whether or not to approve applications for outlets offering unhealthy meals.