Fruits and Vegetables: Eating Your Way to 5 A Day
13 September 2008Are you taking the 5 A Day challenge? You may be if you find yourself:
• Snacking on raw vegetables instead of potato chips
• Adding fruit to your cereal at breakfast
• Using the salad bar when you go out for lunch or to the grocery store
• Loading up on juice instead of a usual coffee, tea or soda.
The challenge, offered by the National Cancer Institute–a branch of the National Institutes of Health–is to eat at least five servings of fruits and vegetables a day, and these are some ways consumers are rising to the occasion.
They’re taking advantage of the healthful benefits of fruits and vegetables. Studies by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, U.S. Department of Agriculture, and the National Academy of Sciences suggest that the nutritional goodness of fruits and vegetables, with a diet that is low in fat, saturated fat and cholesterol and that contains plenty of whole-grain breads and cereals, may decrease the risk of heart disease and cancer.
Fruits’ and vegetables’ potential to help improve the health of Americans led NCI to begin a multi-year public education campaign in 1992. Its goal is to increase consumers’ awareness of the importance of fruits and vegetables and to give consumers ideas on how they can increase their intake. With its partner, the Produce for Better Health (PBH) Foundation–a nonprofit consumer education foundation funded by the produce industry–NCI has taken the “5 A Day for Better Health” message to grocery stores, classrooms, television, work sites, churches, and elsewhere.
Food labeling of fresh, frozen and canned fruits and vegetables may carry the message, too. And if you need more specific nutrition information about a particular item, you can find it in the labeling of most products, as well. The Food and Drug Administration regulates this information, which corresponds to NCI’s Five A Day guidance and the government’s Dietary Guidelines for Americans.
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