How Many Calories Do You Need for a Year?

February 23, 2015

Today I may make some people mad, but I strongly feel that this needs to be said.  I see a lot of recommendations for what equals a year’s supply of food.  Some of these recommendations would kill you.  For instance, I recently saw the following list suggested as a year’s supply for a family of four.

Calories for a year

  • 90 lbs. of white rice

  • 22 lbs. of kidney beans

  • 22 lbs. of barley

  • 22 lbs. of yellow lentils

  • 5 lbs. of split green peas

  • 5 lbs. of garbanzo beans

  • 1 lb. of salt

  • A big box of beef and chicken bouillon.

I thought that this seems very light on the calories so I broke it down to how many calories this amount of food provided.

  • 1616 calories x 90 = 145440 rice

  • 1510 calories x 22 = 33220 kidney beans

  • 1597 calories x 22 = 35134 barley

  • 1525 calories x 22 = 33550 lentils

  • 1547 calories x 5.5 = 8508 split peas

  • 1651 calories 5 5.5 = 9080 garbanzo beans

  • Total calories = 264932 divided by 365 = 725 calories per day.

As you can see this provides only 725 calories per day for four people.  At 2000 calories a day for four, you really only have about 33 days of food. 264,932 divided by 8000 calories = 33 days.

I would consider 8000 calories x 365 days, the minimum caloric intake for one year for a family of 4, that is 2,290,000 calories for the year.  Now 2000 calories per day per person may not be enough if you are performing strenuous labor.

Many people and businesses are putting out false information on what actually constitutes a year’s supply.  Some of the packaged year’s supplies that I see for sale are at best very marginal and some border on the criminal.

I have heard some people say that my product is nutritious that you can live for weeks on small amounts. Nutrition is important and needs to be taken into consideration, but you still need the calories. You need both good nutrition and enough calories. The average male needs a minimum of 2000 calories a day and if doing hard physical labor may need more like 4000.

Unfortunately, some people will die as a result of this bad information that is being distributed, often for personal gain.  Be sure you have enough food and don’t be one of them.

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