Afolabi Gambari
To talk about nutrition may sound as not sound important to many people, because the subject tends to focus only on food and nothing more. Yet, it is a serious business with vast opportunities for money-making as attention is being focused on the subject with regard to education on foods and the nutrients that are gained therefrom, in addition to the function of each of these nutrients on the body with regard to well-being.
Concentrating on macro nutrients alone – the carbohydrate, the protein, the fats and oil – and seeing how important they are, taking them each in excess and not taking them in the right proportion is enough to talk about: a balanced diet in which a certain proportion of protein is taken, a carbohydrate that is the main source of energy, the proportion of protein that is the building block of the body, the physique of the body, human growth in whatever form, in addition to the growth of the cells, the systems and the organs. There is also a need to concentrate on fat and oil and how both can help to duplicate systems to serve as the temperature regulation for the body, and how this further provides energy as well. All this constitutes the knowledge of nutrition, leading to the business of how to provide the information and treatment on nutritional deficiencies.
The knowledge of nutrition entails how to get it in different forms, namely infant nutrition and adult nutrition forms, whose advantages are enormous, especially in the immune system that would be built.
Using Nigeria as a case study, the poor people cannot afford potable water, even as bottled water is also out of their reach. Interestingly, however, it is not only the poor that cannot afford potable water or bottled water; the elite are also, many times, found in the abyss of lack. Meanwhile, water is needed to prepare food for the children and adults as well. The average income earners can well afford any kind of food they want. But lack of proper knowledge on nutrition may still lead them to eat wrongly with the health implications, especially if they also lack understanding of the cautionary aspect of nutrition.
Much money can be made through advocacy in terms of education and enlightenment, including consultancy services to be provided by experts on prevention and management of crises. There is also the tertiary aspect where the adversely affected people are being treated and counselled in order not to return to what led them to seeking treatment – suggesting that it encompasses life from infancy to adulthood, no matter who is poor or rich. It has to be said, however, that while medicine is all about curing and treatment, nutrition is all about prevention. Ultimately, in nutrition, everything starts and ends at awareness.
It is from the foregoing reality that nutrition comes to the front burner. From the woman in the market who sells tomatoes, relating with all categories of customers, to the link between potable water and pipe-borne water, to introducing complementary feeding after stopping breastfeeding, to determining whether potable water will be necessary to prepare complementary food and to addressing how diseases find their way to homes, thereby resulting in taking more people to the hospital. The more these people are exposed to diseases, the more the diseases will spread, and there will be a compelling need for more money to be spent on treatment. The emphasis on water is not misplaced. For instance, potable water would be needed to cook yams. Even if the yam is roasted, potable water would still be needed to drink on them. To thirst is also to need water to drink for rehydration. This is of necessity and has absolutely nothing to do with class and is more about health and well-being.
Taking the local foods offers lots of advantages, especially being in control of preparing the foods. For sure, fast food has been ingrained in a lot of people. But while it is practically impossible for people to shun them, their intakes can still be reduced to the barest minimum. The difference between processed food and the one prepared at home is, after all, glaring at any rate.
It is trite that the starting point for nutrition is food. So, the more people can access good food and have the means of preparing the food, the healthier they will be and the less malnutrition will occur to them. At this juncture, the government should deploy its huge capacity to encourage advocacy for nutrition while also focusing on enlightenment with a view to getting the nutrition message across to all sectors of society, particularly where the vulnerable are located. Parents also have a role to play in injecting the nutrients that the children do not like into the food that they like for easy intake. For instance, some children may love jollof rice and no other food. So, it is expedient for the parents to ensure that the children’s favourite food provides all the necessary nutrients.
It is, perhaps, unknown to many that the rich in society also have problems with nutrition, and a good number of them lack information on the core of what good nutrition entails. For many years, malnutrition has been ascribed to the affliction of only the poor. However, research has since faulted such claims, revealing that the scourge of malnutrition is as vast among the poor as it is among the richest. Only demography creates a demarcation between both two divides, making the larger society focus more attention on the poor due to the assumption that only poverty causes malnutrition. It is just as interesting that despite several efforts being made in recent times to change this mentality, it remains to be seen when it will be erased
