Unit_21_P1_Nutrition

Healthy Eating This report is about how important nutrition is for us. Good nutrition is essential for good health. Food provides energy for the body and the nutrients in foods are vital in keeping us healthy. Nutritious food helps to prevent our bodies from catching vital illnesses and diseases. Heart disease and a third of cancers are caused by poor diet and lack of nutrients. It is good to be aware of your diet and eat the right kinds of foods to stay fit and healthy. In the 1950s due to the war there was a lack of food in the UK and home economics became very important. However this resulted in healthier diets because people had to learn to ration they were in short supply of meat, eggs, sugar and other essentials, they used to have tokens which they traded for these rare foods. Due to rationing people were eating smaller portions of food and the foods they were eating were a lot healthier. The typical meal in the 1950s would consist of a piece of meat with a lot of potatoes and vegetables on the side, on the ‘Eatwell plate’ that we have now it shows that this diet was quite healthy because they were getting a lot of vegetables, a lot of starch from potatoes and a reasonable amount of meat, this is a very balanced diet. On the other hand in this day and age we have more of a variety of foods. People from other countries came to settle in the UK and brought with them there cultural foods which UK citizens were eager to try such as curries, Chinese food and Italian food, due to this we now have more take-a-ways and restaurants. Technology such as the microwave was also introduced which led to microwave foods which are a lot quicker to make but lack in vital vitamins that fresh ingredients contain. Due to all this food, people now are eating more than they should be and don’t have balanced diets at all. Obesity has become a growing problem in the UK and the US because of restaurants such as McDonalds, Pizza Hut, Burger King and others, these restaurants sell foods that contain a lot of grease and fat, when people get used to all this easy access food they continue eating there and this causes them to gain weight and leads to obesity. There has also been a growth in pre-prepared food which people choose to eat because it is easier to just warm up and eat. These foods are unhealthy because they are high in saturated fat. This means people are not getting the nutrients they need from fresh ingredients. Now, people don’t tend to eat a lot of fresh fruit and vegetables in place they have a lot of sweets and cakes that are advertised and this tempts people to buy them, all of these sweets are very high in sugar and having too much sugar in your diet can lead to illnesses such as type two diabetes which is a very serious illness and does not allow you to eat sugary foods. Another snack which can be very unhealthy when eating too much is crisps and peanuts these snacks are high in salt and eating too much salty foods can lead to having a high blood pressure which can lead to death. However the government have started to become more aware of the high levels of obesity and deaths due to people having unhealthy diets and have come up with a few schemes to help prevent these problems. In the year 2000 the NHS started the change4life which helps people by giving them healthy recipes, meal planners and tips on how to make your diet healthier. They also provide information on places you could go to do activities to keep active. We now have an eatwell plate which is very helpful for people who want to have a balanced diet, it shows the different types of food we need to eat and in what proportions we have to eat them in. The government have also made a target for people to eat at least five fruit or vegetables per person per day to help reduce the risk of some cancers, chronic illnesses and heart disease. These days people like to know if they are healthy, getting to the verge of obesity or even underweight, to check this there is the body mass index (BMI) which measures your body fat using your weight and height and shows you on a scale if you are at a healthy weight or not. This report shows us that after the 1950s we have started to get unhealthier due to the larger variety of food we have now. Also due to technology we have started to get lazier because of how easy it is to warm up microwave meals, because of the saturated fats in these microwave meals they are very unhealthy to eat. However some people do tend to eat healthily and we get help from the government such as schemes like ‘change 4 life’ and the idea to eat five fruit or vegetables a day suggestion. So people who happen to be overweight can do something to change. Another way of staying healthy is to eat organic food. Organic food is produced in organic farms which are less damaging for the environment than conventional farms because organic farms do not consume or release pesticides which can harm the soil, water or aquatic wildlife. Organic food has at least 95% of ingredients that are produced from organically produced plants and animals they do not involve modern synthetic inputs such as chemical fertilizers. Organic food production is a heavily managed industry it requires a special certification if it is to be sold in a food markets. People believe that eating organic fruits, vegetables and meat is more nutritious than other foods and some say that it also tastes a lot better than other foods. However some people argue that there is no difference between organic foods and conventional foods and that it is a waste of money to buy organic food rather than other foods. I believe organic food is more environmentally friendlier to make but a majority of people will probably prefers to buy conventional foods as they are cheaper.