Guidelines Dietary - Eat For Health

Children and adolescentsThe recommended quantities of vegetables and fruit intakes for children and adolescents vary depending on theirage and sex. 9 To meet the dietary recommendations, children and adolescents need to approximately double theiroverall vegetable consumption 9 and increase the overall variety of vegetables consumed. Current fruit intakes by2–3 year olds are close to the recommended levels but need to increase proportionately with age.A wide variety of different coloured, textured and tasting vegetables and fruit, both fresh and cooked, should beoffered frequently to toddlers and preschoolers. Parents and carers can provide model behaviour by consuming awide range of vegetables and fruit.Guideline 2Children and adolescents should be encouraged to select a wide variety of vegetables and fruit, at meal timesand between meals. In recent years, most Australian states and territories have improved the nutritional qualityof food supplied at schools through strategies incorporating a colour-coded system in which vegetables, includinglegumes/beans, and fruit are classified ‘green’ with the recommendation that children eat plenty. 431-438 Fruit can be‘fast food’ to help satisfy increasing appetites. Unless prescribed by a dietitian, special diets that restrict intakeof any fruit or vegetables should be avoided for children and adolescents. The intake of energy-dense hot friedpotato chips as a snack or with meals should be limited.Older peopleAlthough most of the emphasis is on the value of dietary patterns rich in vegetables and fruit throughout life, thereis still benefit in adopting such habits later in life. In general, older adults tend to have higher intakes of fruit andvegetables than younger adults. 45 Due to poor dentition, softer textured or cooked vegetables and fruit may bepreferable for some older people. Tinned and/or frozen varieties are nutritious alternatives to raw produce.Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoplesVery low intakes of vegetables and fruit have been described among Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander groupsin urban and rural communities. 30,353,439,440 Availability of quality fresh produce can be a particular problem inmany remote areas. 28,317,356 Frozen and canned vegetables and fruit, plus available traditional plant foods, arenutritious alternatives.2.3 Enjoy grain (cereal) foods, mostly wholegrain and/or highcereal fibre varieties2.3.1 Setting the sceneFoods originating from grains (cereals) include those from wheat, oats, rice, barley, millet and corn. They rangefrom highly nutrient-dense wholegrain breads and grain (cereal) foods such as oats, to lower-nutrient dense whiterice, white bread, pasta and noodles. Excluded are refined grain (cereal) food products with high levels of addedsugar, fat (in particular saturated fat) and/or salt/sodium, such as cakes.Key nutrients in wholegrain foods include starch (complex carbohydrate), protein, dietary fibre, B group vitamins,vitamin E, iron, zinc, magnesium and phosphorus. Other protective components are fermentable carbohydrates,oligosaccharides, flavonoids, phenolics, phytoestrogens, lignans, protease inhibitors, saponins and selenium. 35,36In Australia it is mandatory for wheat flour used in bread making to be fortified with folic acid and thiamin, and forthe salt used to be iodised. 44144EAT FOR HEALTH – australian dietary guidelinesNational Health and Medical Research Council