During the last decade the food and nutrition situation in developing countries has changed dramatically. For better or worse, urbanization and globalization have altered the diet and nutrition in both rural and urban areas. In many developing countries a persistent level of under nutrition exists both in rural areas and in urban slums due to less access to food needed for an active and healthy life. On the other hand, over-nutrition, or eating too much, has emerged among the middle-income groups. It is essential to have a better understanding of how people deal with their food in developing countries, in order to plan and implement food and nutrition programmes. This manual deals with the process of changing food habits and consumption patterns in developing countries. Nutritional implications, together with practical information is discussed in relationship to conducting field surveys. Part one of the manual provides insight into the dynamics of food habits and consumption and its socio-economic and cultural dimensions. Part two gives practical information on small scale surveys to be carried out within the framework of a nutrition issue; including data collecting on food habits and the measurement of food intake. This manual addresses professionals with practical or academic training and those who are involved in various types of food and nutrition programmes or related activities. It can also be used as a handbook in food and nutrition training courses at higher and at academic level.

During the last decade the food and nutrition situation in developing countries has changed dramatically. For better or worse, urbanization and globalization have altered the diet and nutrition in both rural and urban areas. In many developing countries a persistent level of under nutrition exists both in rural areas and in urban slums due to less access to food needed for an active and healthy life. On the other hand, over-nutrition, or eating too much, has emerged among the middle-income groups. It is essential to have a better understanding of how people deal with their food in developing countries, in order to plan and implement food and nutrition programmes. This manual deals with the process of changing food habits and consumption patterns in developing countries. Nutritional implications, together with practical information is discussed in relationship to conducting field surveys. Part one of the manual provides insight into the dynamics of food habits and consumption and its socio-economic and cultural dimensions. Part two gives practical information on small scale surveys to be carried out within the framework of a nutrition issue; including data collecting on food habits and the measurement of food intake. This manual addresses professionals with practical or academic training and those who are involved in various types of food and nutrition programmes or related activities. It can also be used as a handbook in food and nutrition training courses at higher and at academic level.

Includes papers and case studies presented at a FAO workshop held in Rome, Italy from 8 to 10 October 2003

During the past decade, tremendous growth has occurred in the use of nutrition symbols and rating systems designed to summarize key nutritional aspects and characteristics of food products. These symbols and the systems that underlie them have become known as front-of-package (FOP) nutrition rating systems and symbols, even though the symbols themselves can be found anywhere on the front of a food package or on a retail shelf tag. Though not regulated and inconsistent in format, content, and criteria, FOP systems and symbols have the potential to provide useful guidance to consumers as well as maximize effectiveness. As a result, Congress directed the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to undertake a study with the Institute of Medicine (IOM) to examine and provide recommendations regarding FOP nutrition rating systems and symbols. The study was completed in two phases. Phase I focused primarily on the nutrition criteria underlying FOP systems. Phase II builds on the results of Phase I while focusing on aspects related to consumer understanding and behavior related to the development of a standardized FOP system. Front-of-Package Nutrition Rating Systems and Symbols focuses on Phase II of the study. The report addresses the potential benefits of a single, standardized front-label food guidance system regulated by the Food and Drug Administration, assesses which icons are most effective with consumer audiences, and considers the systems/icons that best promote health and how to maximize their use.

This book brings together a selection of studies written by specialists from universities and/or research institutions from every continent. The processes of change in systems of production, commercialisation, and consumption of food, as well as the problems and nutritional habits analysed here, develop within the framework of the technological and socio-productive transformations experienced in many parts of the world as a consequence of the transition from traditional rural societies to the predominantly urban and industrial societies of our time. Many of these societies are affected by the fluctuations, questions, or socio-economic uncertainties caused principally by what is named globalisation. The authors involved in this volume are from a variety of backgrounds and their theoretical-analytical focuses regarding eating habits are quite diverse. However, independent of their different perspectives and scientific disciplines (Anthropology, Communication, Economy, Marketing, Medicine, Nursing, Psychology and Sociology), all of these authors are united in their concerns regarding similar food processes and problems, such as the industrialisation of food production, junk food, fast food, eating disorders, overeating, obesity, the impacts of ideal body images on eating behaviours, lifestyles and feeding, anorexia, bulimia, organic foods, healthy foods, functional foods, and so on. Moreover, in a time shaped by a worldwide standardisation of eating habits, the search for identity, specificity, or distinction through the acquisition and consumption of foods is commonplace in many chapters of the book. Likewise, these chapters show a generalised interest on the negative effects of the advertising and communications media that often drive patterns of food consumption and provoke desires for ideals of beauty and body forms prejudicial to health. As the editor states in the preface, all this occurs in an ever more modernised and globalised world in which artificial procedures of the production of industrial foods that are quite opaque to the general public become increasingly widespread. In such a world, while people's concerns over the healthiness of foods increase, we are witnessing a non-stop expansion of markets for organic food, as well as the repeated manipulation of growing consumers' preferences for certain foodstuffs that they believe are healthy or have specific natural qualities. This manipulation frequently takes place through a variety of advertisements that announce a series of industrial foods as supposedly possessing these qualities. Obviously, a priority objective of these and other advertising strategies is to increase sales in the agro-alimentary sector in a context of obvious over-production and over-supply, which in turn is translated into the stimulation of food consumption. This would help explain such developments in the current consumer society, which is explored in further detail in many chapters of this book.