MORE THAN 2000 YEARS OF MEDITERRANEAN DIET: A JOURNEY FROM ANCIENT ROMANS TO THE UNESCO RECOGNITION IN 2010
THE CULTURAL DIMENSION OF FOOD
From a healthy dietary pattern
to a healthy Mediterranean sustainable life style
Antonia Trichopoulou, MD
Rome, FAO HQ18 September 2019
Mediterranean Diet - The history
2
For millenia
cross- roads of people & civilization
Mediterranean diet is the dietary pattern found in the olive growing areas of the Mediterranean region in the late 50’ and early 60’
The diet of ordinary peopleof classical period in Greece and Rome was derived from
cerealspulsesvegetablesfruitolive oilmilkand a little fish and meat
The traditional Mediterranean diet is associatedwith longer survival
This could be partly attributed to Mediterranean traditional foods on which this diet largely relies
Traditional food is a food of a specific feature or features, which distinguish it clearly from other similar products of the same category, in terms of the use of :
traditional ingredients
traditional composition
traditional type of production and/or processing method
2007, Trends in Food Science &Technology
Investigation of the potential of 194 traditional Greek foods to bear nutrition claims
Comparison of energy content and nutritional composition to the European specifications
on a wide range of nutritional components
2013, Mediterranean Journal of Nutrition and Metabolism
Overall, about 1024 nutrition claims were relevant for the 194 traditional foods studied
Goal 7: Ensure environmental sustainability
ICN2 recognises that food systems
should be assessed for their environmental impact
The Mediterranean diet offers a clear example of a
Sustainable ecosystem
FAO
For the production of traditional foods
local products are generally used
Cultivation of local products contribute to biodiversity
Mediterranean diet has a lower environmental impact
plant-based diet with low consumption of animal products
smaller water footprint
lower greenhouse gas emissions
- Olive trees are a barrier to desertification and erosion
- Olive orchards are a CO2 sink, remove CO2 from the
atmosphere and fix it in the soil
- In the production of 1 liter of olive oil,
olive trees remove 10 kg of CO2 from the atmosphere
Sustainable Olive Oil Production Helps Mitigate Climate Change2016 Convention on Climate Change (COP22)
Towards a Food & Nutrition PolicyThe current food system must be transformed to a
sustainable food system
The reform of has to involve
local communities
and
consider local needs along with national level ones
Thank you
for your attention
