Have eating habits changed in the last 20 years for the better or for the worse?

Résumé du document

A meal is usually defined as the consumption of two or more foods in a structured setting at a set time. Snacks consist of a small amount of food or beverage eaten between meals. A common eating pattern is three meals (breakfast, lunch, and dinner) per day, with snacks between meals. The components of a meal vary across cultures, but generally include grains, such as rice or noodles, meat or a meat substitute, such as fish or beans and accompaniments, such as vegetables. Various food guides provide suggestions on foods to eat, portion sizes, and daily intake. However, personal preferences, habits, family customs, and social setting largely determine what a person consumes.

Over the last century, eating habits in the world have changed dramatically. Our diets have been influenced by all kinds of factors such as the technologies in our kitchens, the modes of transport supplying our shops, the media and the governments and by trade and migration. The eating habits of our parents, grandparents and great-grandparents would be completely unrecognizable to many of us today. Our experiences of shopping and cooking have been transformed as have our attitudes towards health, table manners, 'foreign' foods, waste and choice.

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[...] Have eating habits changed for the better or for the worse in the last 20 years? A meal is usually defined as the consumption of two or more foods in a structured setting at a set time. Snacks consist of a small amount of food or beverage eaten between meals. A common eating pattern is three meals (breakfast, lunch, and dinner) per day, with snacks between meals. The components of a meal vary across cultures, but generally include grains, such as rice or noodles, meat or a meat substitute, such as fish or beans and accompaniments, such as vegetables. [...]

[...] This globalization led companies towards cost reductions programs aimed at outperforming competitors, at the cost of the quality of the products. In Not on the Label1 an anonymous sausage manufacturer states sausage contains: 50% "meat", of which 30% is pork fat with a bit of jowl, and 20% mechanically recovered chicken meat water rusk and soya, soya concentrate, hydrolyzed protein, modified flour, dried onion, sugar, dextrose, phosphates, preservative E221 sodium sulphite, flavor enhancer, spices, garlic flavoring, antioxidant E300 (ascorbic acid), coloring E128 (red Due to these changes, an increasing number of people are now becoming concerned by what they eat. [...]

[...] By focusing on a small number of varieties for intensive cultivation, modern agriculture has led to a loss of biodiversity. Many of these lost varieties are essential to research and development. Likewise, the science of taking genes from one species and inserting them into another is a serious threat to biodiversity and maybe our own health. We are told that GM crops will help feed the world's poor but according to the United Nations, we already produce more than enough food to satisfy everyone. [...]

[...] Finally, fresh fruits and vegetables are mostly grown with the use of pesticides or packed with preservatives that jeopardize health and diminish nutrients in these products Effects on Environment The development of means of transportation and their decreasing costs led to the creation of a new concept: the food miles. This denotes the distance food travels from field to plate, and it is a way of indicating the environmental impact of the food we eat. Half of the vegetables and 95 per cent of the fruit eaten in the UK, come from beyond their shores. [...]

[...] Statistics from UK emphasize the fact that amount spent in eating out by households, surpassed spending on food sector products eaten at home in 2004”[i]. More and more people now eat on the run. In 2006, the global fast food market grew by and reached a value of 102.4 billion, with a volume of 80.3 billion transactions. In India alone, the fast food industry is growing by 40% a year. The consumption of fresh products like fruits, vegetables or meat is steadily decreasing. The people of the 21st century consume processed products. [...]