Parents play key role in developing children’s eating habits

By Patricia Thangaraj

 

Parents have a very important role to play in making sure that their children eat healthy since they are the ones who purchase the food.

 

This is the belief of Pamela Payne-Wilson, Assistant Director of the Barbados Drug Service (BDS) who spoke with The Barbados Advocate on the sidelines of the seminar on good food choices at the Nazarene Church yesterday.

 

She stated that the children can also play a part when they go grocery shopping with their parents, they can say they only want healthy snacks.

 

“The parents do have a major role because even though the children have the information, it is the parents who are actually holding the purse strings and making the necessary choices in terms of what they should purchase. So the children working alongside their parents can tell mummy or daddy, ‘I don’t want to have that sugary snack. I want to have a fruit or a vegetable. I have learnt these things from my sessions and they make you nice and strong’. [Therefore] when parents get that kind of pressure from the children, [they] would get on board because we have to work with our parents too, with the adults in terms of making healthy food choices,” she explained.

 

In stating that her organisation plans to continue working with the parents as they recognise the importance of this partnership. Furthermore, they are also planning to continue their partnerships with those persons who sell snacks outside of the schools including the School Meals Department, the breakfast groups, the Home Economics teachers and other stakeholders involved in nutrition in an effort to ensure that all of these groups play their respective roles in advancing the nutritional habits of the young ones as it relates to imparting knowledge and advising them to make wise choices when it comes to their diet.