After a busy day, when I reached Goa airport, I was feeling a bit hungry. Reached a food stall made at the airport and when I looked at the menu, it was also written along with the price of each food item, how many calories are in it. Every food item had huge amount of calories and no food item was available in small portions. The last two decades have seen an increase in the availability of junk food, which are foods that contain the wrong ratio of nutrients and are high in calories, sugar, salt, fat, etc. These harmful things have now reached far away villages. Most are sold as 'get one get one free' deals. The result is that obesity and junk food-related diseases such as heart disease and diabetes are on the rise across the world, across all income age groups.
On the lines of 'Better late than never', some countries are making policies that reduce the use of junk food. For the sale of these goods, there is a provision to ban the use of methods like buy five get 25% discount. Such goods cannot be kept hanging in the front of the shop and have to be kept in the back. No TV channel shall telecast advertisement of such food items between 7 am to 9 pm. The laws will come into effect from October 2023.
Talking about implementing the method of 'star rating' on substances. Each food item will be assigned a star rating of between half and five by a complex formula and the producer will have to print it on the packet as you currently see in air conditioners or fridges based on power consumption. The lower the star rating of a food item, the more unhealthy the food. But there are many flaws in this proposal. Firstly, the standards set in this rating system are on the lower side as compared to the standards of the World Health Organisation. A very unhealthy food can also get two and three stars in the star rating. This rating does not describe any food item as 'unhealthy'. The biggest weakness is that people can get confused with the star rating and think that it is a standard of quality. This method will not be of much help in choosing whether to buy a food item or not. There is complete agreement among public health experts that the government should reconsider this proposal immediately. A better alternative is the 'traffic light' system used in other countries.
Next time wait for two minutes before eating, think whether the things in your food are healthy? Somewhere oil and sugar in them are not more than you need. Remember, whenever you feel hungry, first drink water. It may be that what you think of as hunger may be just thirst. After eating food, even if it is just for a short time, do take a walk. New research says that walking for even two minutes after a meal is better than sitting. We have to look into these measures immediately.
