The film may be hinting toward the immorality aka gluttony of Chinese people which is actually racist given that the director is Japanese.

Like even though he included some Japanese items it was largely Chinese based and he assigned it a negative aspect because the parents greedily devoured Chinese looking foods and turned into pigs and the faceless ghoul (or whatever his name was) also stuffed large quantities of Chinese looking foods until he exploded or something like that

Then to save herself she ate a Japanese rice ball thus conveying the idea that Japanese food is ~good~ and ~moral~

It's also very peculiar that the era is Heian themed which is a period of Japanese history marked by exuberant Chinese influences. It's interesting that a witch who has ~Western~ tastes saves her:



So I think one way to look at this film is that it's a subtly anti-Chinese culture film about Japan abandoning the ~immoral~ and ~inferior~ Chineseness, whilst celebrating ~moral~ and ~superior~ Japaneseness, and embracing the ~Westerness~ that saved Japan.

NB: The Witch represents the West for Japanese people because she has a twin sister, one was evil and one was good. But in the end the evil witch isn't so evil after all and has redeeming qualities or something like that. So I think the witch characterises the general sentiment of the West that the Japanese have: the West is both good and bad but ultimately good. Note the huge nose which is often used as a stereotype for Westerners:

I've read some sources suggesting that the setting for Spirited Away was based on the Taiwanese town of Jiufen (https://munchies.vice.com/en/articles/in-jiufen-you-can-eat-your-way-through-a-miyazaki-film).

Miyazaki himself is a genius who always created movies from the heart. He is a staunch pacifist holding the opinion that Japan should come to terms with its inner demons and apologize explicitly for its role across Asia during WWII.

His final film was poignant critique of the Japanese war machine (http://www.wnyc.org/story/hayao-miyazakis-final-film-is-an-uneasy-love-letter-to-a-war-machine/). As a result, he's been viciously and unfairly attacked by Japanese ultranationalists.

This speaks highly of Miyazaki. His enlightened views are a stark contrast to blathering idiots like EB88's 'Japanese' mod, MrC-rap.