Students taking a closer look at the model food items while Assistant Nutrition Officer (Acting) with the National Nutrition Centre, Glencill Taylor speaks to them about where in the Caribbean Food Groups each item would be found.

EAT HEALTHIER

Tue, 05/24/2016 - 12:00am

Children encouraged to eat more fruits and vegetables

By:

Marsha Gittens

Children are not consuming fruits and vegetables as often as they should and this is a trend one of this island’s Nutrition Officer would like to see change.

Assistant Nutrition Officer (Acting) with the National Nutrition Centre, Glencill Taylor told The Barbados Advocate that many children would have their staple foods and generally protein foods such as chicken and fish. However, “fruits and vegetables and the peas at times” are usually not eaten as often as they should be.

“We want the parents to recognise that we want to get those fruits and vegetables in the children’s diet every day and one day a week on Sunday is not good enough,” she lamented.

Furthermore, “Back to the whole idea of expensive, when you look at a box juice compared to a fruit, we pay more for a box juice than we pay for a fruit, so ‘it is expensive’ is relative… The box juice is nicely packaged, but you can get probably two fruits for the price of one box juice. When you look at the snacks that children typically would have many of them are more expensive than a serving of fruit or even two servings of fruits. So we really need to look [at this]. It may mean directing the money that we have in a different area into the fruits as opposed to the sweet drinks or the lot of sweet or salty [or] high sugar snacks that they quite often have on a regular basis.”

Taylor’s comments came while speaking on the side-lines of her session on making healthy food choices. This interactive session was done yesterday with the Class 4s at the People’s Cathedral School.

During her visit, Taylor spoke to the pupils about incorporating items from the Caribbean Food Groups, water and low fat milk daily in their diets. She also spoke to the students about removing fat from their meats and selecting fruits as a snack as well as reminded them about the importance of including at least one hour of physical activity into their day-to-day routine.

Taylor also spoke to the Class 4s about the work done by the nutritionists and dieticians of the Centre and where it is located. She additionally encouraged them to visit the Centre’s website during their leisure time.

Her talk formed part of the Centre’s activities for Nutrition Week 2016 which will conclude this Friday. The theme for the period is ‘Healthy Foods for Children and Young People’.

EAT HEALTHIER

Barbados Advocate

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