#FocusontheFacts #NutritionFactstable #NutritionFacts #foodliteracy #foodsecurity #foodsovereignty #Foodnutrition #nutritionletarcy #intersectionality
“Innumerable industry standards, government regulations, and other practices protect households with regard to food quality and safety. However, households themselves play an important role in achieving key food objectives in Canada, including food safety, healthy food decisions, and environmental sustainability. Households have some influence in each of these areas, especially through their spending decisions.” ~ Report: WHAT’S TO EAT? Improving Food Literacy in Canada – The Conference Board of Canada
“Despite B.C.’s reputation as the healthiest province in Canada, approximately 1.2 million British Columbians have one or more chronic health conditions, many of which are preventable. In 2003, only 40 per cent of the province’s adults reported eating five or more fruit and vegetable servings per day and 42 per cent of British Columbians were overweight and obese.” Report: WHAT’S TO EAT? Improving Food Literacy in Canada – The Conference Board of Canada
You have power: shared power over your health and that of your family; shared power over what the grocery store, the restaurant and the supermarket offer and sell; shared power on whether peoples’ livelihoods in your own community and around the world are empowered and whether ecosystems around the world are regenerated.
You exercise that power every day when you buy, consume and prepare food and drinks.
That power is called food sovereignty, the right to make your choices about what you eat. But with choice and rights come responsibility. Unwise, careless or uninformed choices also have power: the power to make people sick or dependent, to pollute, to destroy and to diminish health, communities and ecosystems…
Last week we explored the contradictory results from two studies on the effect of food literary (specifically food skills) in food security.
As someone who has been teaching and advocating for food sovereignty for the last 5+ years, I expressed my bias, that food literacy is key for people to be food sovereign/secure.
We also saw how being too busy and paying attention to marketing and “convenience” created patterns of food consumption that were unhealthy for us and bad for the environment, as well as potentially unfair for many peoples around the world whose own food security, local economies and wellbeing continue to be disrupted by our consumption patterns.
One of the most pervasive challenges when trying to create healthy and sustainable eating patterns is the overwhelming amount of information, many of it misleading, about what’s good and what’s bad when it comes to food nutrition.
Self efficacy and confidence in relation to food choices is listed as the third key attribute of food literacy by Food Literacy for Life, a call to action and study (2017) by Food Literacy Canada.
What this means is that you develop the ability to distinguish between credible and false nutrition information (and I would add, from memes about what’s sustainable and what’s not, ethically speaking). This may sound overwhelming, particularly if you have a full-time job, a family to tend and bills to pay, right?
But, I ask, isn’t more overwhelming to become unhealthy, dependent, potentially make others sick and dependent and have no clue on our impact on others and the planet?
When people are interviewed about food choices and their food skills, they all seem to care. I personally have no doubt every single parent wants their children and everyone else’s children to be healthy. I also think that, given the information and opportunity, people will most of the time make the right choice.
So, why these behaviours are so difficult to change? Why do we follow misleading “advice” and trust pseudo-scientific sources and claims? Why do we tend to buy always the same products and cook in the same way?
And, more importantly, how can we change this and regain our sovereignty over our health and the food we eat?
First, let’s clarify that food and health, as many other areas of sovereignty, are deeply shaped by intersectionality: the many factors, from gender and sexual orientation to ethnicity and socioeconomic status that make an individual or entire group oppressed and unprivileged when it comes to “choices”.
What this means is that not every person has the same freedom to “choose”, and that the responsibility for healthy and safe eating choices is shared by everyone. The better we do this, the more inclusive, healthy and democratic our communities will be.
Here are some tips and resources to regain some control over your and your family food choices and help others to do the same:
- Avoid rush hour: when we buy in a rush, we don’t have time to read labels or be careful and tend to take the first item just to make it to the line.
- Buy food from the outer aisles of the supermarket: The inner aisles tend to have the food that makes you sick and you need less of: sugars, fats, pre-packaged meals, etc. while most grocery stores have their vegetables, fruits and dairy on the outer aisles.
- Buy healthy foods in bulk, if possible with a friend or neighbour, they are cheaper that way, and you may find ways to preserve them by freezing, drying, fermenting, pickling or canning.
- Buy foods that are produced local and seasonal: you’ll get the best in nutrients and flavour and will be supporting local farmers, avoiding the cost on peoples and planet of foods shipped from far away.
- Read the ingredients, not only the expiry date: buy foods with the least ingredients or with no labels (they tend to be whole and real food!)
- Buy frozen vegetables and fruit when not in season: they preserve the nutrients and have almost zero additives.
- Learn to read food labels, not only expiry date! Visit Nutrition Facts to learn more (with videos and graphics: https://www.canada.ca/en/health-canada/campaigns/nutrition-facts.html
- Understand portions and food groups, learn how to cook foods that may be new to you, or to replace ingredients to make your food healthier: http://www.healthycanadians.gc.ca/eating-nutrition/healthy-eating-saine-alimentation/tips-conseils/interactive-tools-outils-interactifs/eat-well-bien-manger-eng.php
- Learn how to choose healthy drinks: https://www.healthyfamiliesbc.ca/home/articles/healthy-drinks
Know and share some facts and resources:
- Water is the best and healthier drink for us all from babies to seniors, and it’s free. If your water is not drinkable, learn ways to make it safe: https://www.cdc.gov/healthywater/emergency/drinking/making-water-safe.html
- Healthy eating, particularly when it is also good for the environment, contrary to what many want us to think, is not boring or expensive, join or ask your community centre for a Food Skills for Family workshop: https://foodskillsforfamilies.ca/
- Community, school and home food gardens and forests make a huge difference not only in your diet and lifestyle but also in the safety and engagement of your community, schools and neighbourhood: https://greenleafcommunities.org/the-many-benefits-of-community-gardens/
- Grains don’t make you fat or tired if you learn the variety and choices you have: http://healthygrains.ca/fact-sheets-3/
- Pulses go beyond beans and peas, and they are not only good for you but for the planet, and…they are really inexpensive!: https://pulses.org/nap/health-nutrition/ and here: https://pulses.org/nap/
- Vegetables and fruits should be eating daily: https://www.canada.ca/en/health-canada/services/food-nutrition/canada-food-guide/choosing-foods/vegetables-fruit.html
Read more:
Intersectionality and health equity: http://nccdh.ca/resources/entry/public-health-speaks-intersectionality-and-health-equity
Recipes for healthy eating: https://www.canada.ca/en/health-canada/services/tips-healthy-eating/eat-well-recipes.html
Report: WHAT’S TO EAT? Improving Food Literacy in Canada – The Conference Board of Canada:
https://www.conferenceboard.ca/e-library/abstract.aspx?did=5727
Report: Enough for All: Household Food Security in Canada -The Conference Board of Canada: https://www.conferenceboard.ca/e-library/abstract.aspx?did=5723
Do you have your own ideas?
Share them with us! We want to learn from you!
Share our ideas with us, and follow us in social media:
Your Opinion Matters: