How the Agricultural Revolution Destroyed Our Diet
The first caveman diet consisted mainly of protein, in the shape of meat and fish. This constituted approximately two thirds of the typical intake. The remainder was in the form of carbohydrates, but these were solely fruit and vegetables.
It is necessary to remember that this was the diet for our species for centuries, if not millennia. The modification in food intake came solely recently. It came with the arrival of the agricultural revolution, when man may finally grow his own food, in the form of grains like wheat, rye, corn, and so forth. He could then grind them, store them and bake them, to be eaten when his heart desired.
In the first stages, the food produced was still very high in fibre and roughage, allowing a slow absorption of glucose into the blood stream. But, because the milling process became ever more efficient, the flour that resulted became whiter and finer, and more easily digested and absorbed.
Trendy Food
Over the years it became additional trendy to eat the white and refined flour products. As a matter of truth, it just about became a status symbol. So the cattle got the great stuff - the fibre, the roughage and most of the vitamins, and humans got the empty calories.
Extracting the taste and losing the price, was a phenomenon that wasn't restricted to the grain industry. As technology advanced we became higher and better at extracting sugars and fats and adding them, in a very attractive and attractive approach, to a plethora of food product, abundant of which is junk food.
One only wants to travel to a supermarket or a petroleum station to see row once row of chocolates, sweets, bars, gums and simply regarding everything you can potential imagine that may masquerade as real food.
The important problem is that these merchandise are terribly tasty. Abundant time, analysis and money have been spent on creating positive that they are attractive to our palates. If you then add clever marketing and attention-grabbing packaging, you end up with a product that is almost irresistible.
In the times when merchandise like these were thought-about a treat, the matter wasn't so significant. Nearly anyone could afford to have a taste treat each therefore typically and not do much damage. However now these merchandise are cheap and very cheap and they are to be found everywhere you turn. There's no escape.
The sad reality is that several individuals consider these junk foods to be so abundant part of traditional eating, that to be while not them is taken into account to be the peak of self-denial. Add to the current the cheap and accessible quick food trade, and you have a drawback of catastrophic proportions that's simply around the corner.
Obesity Epidemic and Food Manufacturers
It is no surprise that we have a plague of obesity within the Western world, one that's being closely followed by an rising epidemic of maturity onset diabetes mellitus.
In order to appreciate a number of the forces that are driving this epidemic we tend to want to appear at the economics of food in this country. Of the $ 75 billion that's spent on the food business in Australia, 5.zero% is spent on producers and a lot of than 90.0% is spent on refiners.
This ratio says it all. A significant driver of the change in our eating habits is the mighty dollar. The makers who make most of the profits want to market additional aggressively and advertise additional in order to sell more products.
One widespread technique used by manufacturers and their advertising firms, is to target a food or nutrient that's thought-about healthy or advantageous for weight loss, and then create a replacement product utilizing that specific nutrient as an ingredient.
As an example, protein is taken into account to be healthy and helpful for weight loss, so a protein bar is created and marketed as a snack food for those who want a protein snack. The matter is that the producing method and several of the ingredients and preservatives utilized in the process create a product that is way off from the original protein snack. It's abundant a lot of likely that the top product is comparatively unhealthy, and usually fattening.
Unless we have a tendency to educate and inform consumers about the foods they are treating as staples, the problem can only get worse. In Australia the prevalence of overweight doubled between 1985 and 1995, while the rates of obesity have trebled. Currently twenty-25% of youngsters and adolescents in Australia are overweight or obese. Within the USA things is even worse, with the speed of obesity in some states, classified as a BMI of more than thirty, and has effects on approximately one out of every 3 people within the state.
The consequences for the health of the population are thus adverse that actuaries are currently predicting that unless something is finished soon, the lifespan of the current generation of children is doubtless to be a minimum of ten years but their parents.
Writers Room has been writing articles online for nearly 2 years now. Not only does this author specialize in Agriculture, you can also check out his latest website about:
Cheap Climbing Gear Which reviews and lists the best