How many people in the World follow the Paleo Diet?

[Paleo Flâneur]

Hello everyone,

This is my first post on the forum and I'm happy to be here! I'm French, currently living in New Zealand and Paleo Aficionado.

I've been wondering how many people in the world follow the Paleo Diet? I could unfortunately not really find any information be searching online. It would be great to have a number for each country but it guess this might be a little bit too much to ask. 

Please let me know if you know where I could find the answer if you have some resources. If you don't know, it would be great if you could give me your thoughts anyway.

I found on another forum that Rob Wolff once said that approximately 1 million in the US do so (posted on Dec. 2015)

Thank you in advance for your help!

Antoine

[TylerDurden]

No idea. One also has to include the number of hunter-gatherers who practise palaeolithic diets. Also, there are many people who follow a palaeolithic diet but who do not necessarily view themselves as  palaeodieters.

[ys]

Paleo/Primal (including low carb) Diet has been somewhat popular lately and sites like paleohacks have significant traffic. But that's all cooked Paleo.  Number of people who eat raw animal food is really miniscule.

[TylerDurden]

AV claimed 20,000 primal dieters in the USA alone. Then there are the Instinctos, the raw-leaning hunter-gatherer tribes like the nenets. I would say there are a lot more than one might think. I have even occasionally met people who did not identify as being rawpalaeo but who simply ate meat raw because it was less hassle than to cook it.

[Paleo Flâneur]

Thank you for your input guys. I know it is difficult (not to say impossible) to know how many there is. This is good though to have an estimate. I'll keep digging 

[cherimoya_kid]

If we define it as eating a diet that has no foods in it that have to be (and/or are nearly always eaten cooked) cooked, AND also includes at least some raw animal foods regularly, I'd bet a few hundred thousand eat that way, maybe even a million.

[Paleo Flâneur]

Thanks for sharing your thoughts cherimoya_kid. You're right, it depends on the definition we make from Paleo and this is why it is really difficult to have a number, especially because there is anyway no exact figures on this.

I thought there might have been some resources though and would really appreciate if anyone would have one. Yes, I'm still hoping 

[PaleoPhil]

I think Wolff and Cordain's estimate of roughly 1 million plus people for the total, including both cooked and raw versions, sounds like a decent estimate.

There has been a recent decline in Google Trends Internet hits (https://www.google.com/trends/explore#q=%22paleo%20diet%22) on the term "Paleo diet" and some decrease in traffic at veteran Paleo blogs and forums like this one, so it's possible that the numbers have fallen off some. There tend to be ebbs and flows and cycles. If Jeb Bush or Hillary Clinton get elected (both of whom reportedly consider their diets "Paleo"), then there will likely be another spike in interest for a while.

Ironically, it's only after public interest has been declining that some in the media have started to say that Paleo has gone mainstream (probably due to increasing celebrity endorsements  ): http://www.mercurynews.com/bay-area-living/ci_28105410/paleo-diet-out-cave-and-into-mainstream    I knew it wouldn't get much kind or even neutral media treatment until enough bogus celebrities endorsed it.

[Paleo Flâneur]

Thanks for your great input and the links PaleoPhil! I think I'll simply use 1 million as the number and will say this is an approximation. There is anyway no possibility to get any better number.

But if you come across some more information, please let me know. I will do the same ! 

[TylerDurden]

The figure must be much higher, though if you include modern palaeo hunter-gatherers.

[PaleoPhil]

I suppose you could say 1-2 million to include those. I doubt there's more than a million of them left, though I haven't seen estimates.

[PaleoComics]

I have read once on Amazing paleo forum that the figure is about 1 million.  But I think the figure should be more than that if we have more reliable data from most developing countries.