Food and Fat Variety: Basic for Human Health

by Professor Mark L. Wahlqvist AO
Editor-in-chief of healthyeatingclub.com
Director, Asia Pacific Health & Nutrition Centre, Monash Asia Institute, Melbourne

Food variety provides for several dimensions to human health. The first is that it encourages biodiversity and sustainability (1), the second is that it allows for nutritional adequacy of essential nutrients and other biologically advantageous food components, notably phytochemicals. The third is that it minimizes adverse consequences of food on health. The fourth is that it provides interest in food and the likelihood that it will be eaten. The fifth is that it encourages social activity through the crossing of personal, family, community and ethnic barriers which relate to food (2).

Food variety is expressed as the number of biologically distinct foods eaten over a designated period of time (eg. 25 types of food per week) (3). It can be constructed to take in time frames which allow for season and celebration. It can also embrace type of food processing as well as biological distinctiveness (4), to demonstrate health relevance.

With time, the understanding of the mechanisms which link food variety to health outcomes are being understood (5,6,7) - these include the dietary capture of essential nutrients and phytochemicals which might otherwise be missed, effects on bioavailability, and reduced impact of food toxins which may occur naturally, adventitiously, or in food preparation.

Both the WHO (8) and now the National Heart Foundation of Australia (2002), encourage a variety of fat sources, both plant and animal, including those which are unrefined from plant sources (eg. seeds, nuts, fruits and algae), from fish and non-ruminant for animal sources and lean or low fat for ruminant animal (sheep or cattle) sources. There is growing recognition that some algal fats contain long chain n-3 fatty acids. Traditional fat sources, in a varied or mixed diet - like red palm fruit in West Africa (9,10) - played a key role in health outcomes, providing enough energy and a range of micronutrients and phytochemicals. For optimal health, however, food (and fat) variety needs to be combined with regular physical activity, so that energy balance is achieved. Such advice has public health and clinical utility (11).

Food security programmes, at their best, will ensure enough food from diverse sources, whether locally produced and stored across seasons or through trade, allowing for adverse climate and misadventure (12).

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References
1. Wahlqvist ML & Specht RL. Food variety and biodiversity: Econutrition. Asia Pacific Journal of Clinical Nutrition 1998; 7(3/4):314-319.
2. Horwath CC. A random population study of the dietary habits of elderly people. PhD thesis. University of Adelaide, 1987.
3. Hodgson JM, Hsu-Hage BH-H, Wahlqvist ML. Food variety as a quantitative descriptor of food intake. Ecology of food and nutrition 1994; 32:137-148.
4. Hsu-Hage B & Wahlqvist ML. Food variety of adult Melbourne Chinese: A case study of a population in transition. In: Dietary patterns of selected countries, tea and coffee: Metabolic consequences. World Review of Nutrition and Dietetics 1996, 79: 53-69.
5. Wahlqvist ML, Lo CS & Myers KA. Food variety is associated with less macrovascular disease in those with Type II diabetes and their healthy controls. Journal of American College of Nutrition, 8(6):515-523, 1989.
6. Kant AK, Schatzkin A, Harris TB, Ziegler RG and Block G. Dietary diversity and subsequent mortality in the First National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey Epidemiologic Follow-up Study. Am J Clin Nutr 1993; 57:434-440.
7. Kant AK, Schatzkin A, Ziegler RG. Dietary diversity and subsequent cause-specific mortality in the NHANES I epidemiologic follow-up study. J Am Coll Nutr 1995; 14:233-238.
8. Wahlqvist ML. Development of Food-Based Dietary Guidelines for the Western Pacific Region. World Health Organization, Manila, June 1999.
9. Kiple KF and Ornelas KC. The Cambridge World History of Food (2 volumes). Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2000.
10. National Primary Healthcare Development Agency and World Health Organization. Nigerian Guide Book. On adequate nutrition for all ages. National Primary Healthcare Development Agency and World Health Organization, April 1999.
11. Savige GS, Hsu-Hage B & Wahlqvist ML. Food variety as nutritional therapy. Current Therapeutics March 1997; 57-67.
12. Wahlqvist ML, Kouris-Blazos A, Savige GS. Food security and the Aged. In: Ogunrinade A, Oniang'o R, May J, eds. Not by Bread Alone. Food Security and Governance in Africa. Toda Institute for Global Peace and Policy Research. South Africa: Witwatersrand University Press, 1999: 206-221.

Last Updated: September, 2002.