Originally published December 18 2005
FAO releases Family Nutrition Guide to fight global problem of malnutrition
by Mike Adams, the Health Ranger, NaturalNews Editor
The UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) continues its public campaign for improved nutrition education around the world, as it believes the dispersion of knowledge about healthy foods is a powerful way to reduce malnutrition around the world.
Poverty and a lack of nutritional education are to blame for the unhealthy diets of millions of people across the world, the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) declared on Tuesday.
"To be food secure, families need sufficient resources to produce or purchase adequate food," said FAO Nutrition Officer Peter Glasauer, "but people also need an understanding of what constitutes an appropriate diet for good health, and they must have the skills and motivation to make the best food choice available to them."
He stressed that nutritional education was key to developing the skills and motivation needed to eat well, adding that it was especially important in situations where families had limited resources.
He also said that it was in those same low-income situations that the challenge of providing nutritional education was often the greatest.
A lack of trained personnel, coupled with a shortage of libraries, books, guidelines, internet connections and other sources of information, made educating people about nutrition a formidable challenge.
But meeting this challenge was essential if progress was to be made on the global commitment to reach the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), the FAO official indicated.
Fundamentally, the MDGs were about improving the health and welfare of the poor, and in most instances this could not occur without improvements in nutrition, Glasauer said.
The Family Nutrition Guide published by the FAO helps governments and non-governmental organizations to inform and motivate people to adopt healthy diets and lifestyles throughout their lives, the official said.
Improving access to adequate food and promoting better dietary intakes were central activities in the FAO's drive to reduce the number of hungry and malnourished people around the world, thus helping achieve the goal of the World Food Summit and the Millennium Development Goals, the FAO chief said.
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