1. Wholegrains: Heart disease
A literature review looking at the role of cereal grains and the prevention of coronary heart disease and stroke, from Australia's CSIRO Human Nutrition division, has been published in the European Journal of Clinical Nutrition. The review found that the intake of wholegrain foods clearly protects against heart disease and stroke.
2. High fibre: For kids' hearts
According to a study from the University of California, keeping overweight children on a 'nutritious' high-fibre / low-fat diet and encouraging them to exercise, showed a dramatic reduction in their cholesterol and insulin levels.
3. Wholegrains: Benefit all women
New research from the Harvard School of Public Health has shown that daily consumption of wholegrains, previously reported to lower the risk of diabetes in Caucasian women, could also cut the risk in African-American women by 30 per cent.
4. Grains in the News:
Convenience: Trumps healthy eating
A new report called Eating Patterns in America reveals that convenience remains the driving force behind consumer purchasing decisions, despite increased emphasis on healthy eating.
Folic acid : Fortification on hold
The recommendation to introduce mandatory folic acid to bread in Australia and New Zealand will undergo further review according to a joint statement released by ministers from both countries.
Nutrition : Labelling
According to a study published by the European Food Information Council, there is a huge gap in the food industry's understanding of how nutrition information labelling influences the buying behaviour of consumers. Meanwhile in Australia, the voluntary Percent Daily Intake scheme has recently been unveiled.
Barley & rye : Overlooked
Under-utilised and often considered 'minor' cereal grains, barley and rye have major health benefits. A presentation given at the World Grains Summit, in San Francisco said that they could be used to add variety to new wholegrain foods.
Healthy grain : $12.5 million parternship
CSIRO, through the Food Futures Flagship, French cereals group Limagrain and the Grains Research Development Corporation has announced a new partnership to accelerate the development of new super healthy wheat varieties.
An international research review on wholegrains role in preventing heart disease, first announced by Go Grains in 2005, has been published in the October edition of the European Journal of Clinical Nutrition.
The CSIRO study found that people who eat wholegrain foods regularly can have a 20 to 40 per cent lower risk of heart disease and stroke compared with those who rarely eat wholegrain foods.
The new review, conducted by Dr Peter Clifton and Ingrid Flight from the CSIRO Human Nutrition division, included research conducted around the world with people from all backgrounds, in all age groups and from different cultures.
Dr Clifton said most Australians would be surprised to know there is this much protection against Australia's biggest killer available right at their fingertips, just by altering their diet.
"The 20 to 40 per cent reduction in risk of heart disease and stroke by increasing wholegrain food intake is a huge benefit compared to the effect of other foods commonly promoted for heart health," Dr Clifton said.
"For example, we see a 10 to 15 per cent reduction in heart disease risk with increased fruit and vegetable intake, and about the same risk reduction with use of the cholesterol-lowering sterol margarine spreads.
"However, the benefit of up to 40 per cent reduction in risk from increasing wholegrain intake to around four servings a day is comparable to the effect we get from the powerful 'statin' drugs doctors now prescribe to lower blood cholesterol levels," Dr Clifton said.
Researchers still don't know exactly what component of wholegrains actually produces the beneficial effect.
"Most likely it is a combination of factors working together that gives wholegrains a powerful health-promoting effect that is greater than the sum of its individual parts," Dr Clifton said.
Wholegrain foods and legumes contain many 'phytochemicals' - including fibre, resistant starch, antioxidants, p hytoestrogens and unsaturated fatty acids - that can help protect the body against diseases such as heart disease and stroke.
They also contain vitamins and minerals (Vitamin E, Vitamin B6, folate, selenium, copper, iron, zinc and manganese, magnesium) and other components which may act as antioxidants to neutralise damaging free radicals. Wholegrain cereals have actually been found to be equal, or higher, in antioxidants than fruits or vegetables.
"But none of these factors alone account for the beneficial effect, so we believe it's a number of different protective factors acting together in the wholegrain," Dr Clifton said.
One surprising finding in the literature review related to Glycaemic Index (GI) and wholegrain foods. GI is a measure of the rate at which carbohydrates are digested, and high GI foods are often associated with increased disease rates.
"However, if your carbohydrates are wholegrain, they will be protective against heart disease and stroke, even though they have a high GI rating," Dr Clifton said.
"The protective effect of other components in wholegrain foods appears to outweigh any role played by GI, making it clear that the GI rating for food is only one factor to consider when choosing a healthy diet for optimum health and disease prevention," he said.
To view the full literature review, available online in PDF format, click here.
Overweight children kept on a "nutritious" diet and encouraged to exercise during a two-week period showed a dramatic reduction in cholesterol and insulin levels, according to a study by researchers from the University of California.
The children, aged 9 to 15, were kept on high-fibre, low-fat and low-cholesterol diets, rich in fruit, vegetables and wholegrains, with moderate amounts of lean protein.
The researchers found that after two weeks, total cholesterol levels fell on average 21 per cent, while LDL (bad) cholesterol dropped 25 per cent. Insulin levels also decreased around 30 per cent.
The scientists, led by Dr James Barnard, claimed their study demonstrates that simple changes in diet and exercise, even after a very short period, can have significant protective effects against heart disease.
The research was prompted after the publication in 2002 of autopsy studies on nearly 3,000 people aged 15 to 34 who had died of external causes. The results of the autopsies revealed that arteries began to be clogged by the growth of "fatty streaks," or plaque build-up, as early as the teenage years. The fatter the teenager, the more advanced the disease.
"Fat tissue produces chemicals that we now know are directly correlated with the development of heart disease. Obese children are going to end up with heart disease far earlier in life - in their 30s and 40s, maybe even earlier," said Dr Barnard.
The adolescents who participated in the study spent two weeks in a program at the Pritikin Longevity Center & Spa in Florida, US. They exercised for around 2.5 hours a day and were allowed to eat as much as they liked of the foods provided.
The researchers also tracked beneficial changes in what they termed 'novel' risk factors - chemicals that fat tissue churns out, called adipocyte-derived factors that are directly linked with plaque build-up in the coronary arteries.
Blood tests taken after the two-week period also revealed improvements in fat-tissue-derived risk factors, such as leptin, which fell 57 per cent, and TNFa, which dropped 43 per cent, said the researchers. There was very little change in weight.
"We've known for a long time that obesity is related to the development of heart disease, but we really didn't know why. That's partly because for years scientists thought fat tissue was dormant, just a storage tank for excess calories. Now we know it's actually an endocrine organ, a very active factory that pumps out chemicals that stimulate the growth of plaque," said Dr Barnard.
He added that simple lifestyle changes can have beneficial results, and that children "didn't need to lose a lot of weight before reaping remarkable rewards for their hearts."
Daily consumption of wholegrains, a rich source of magnesium, previously reported to lower the risk of diabetes in white women, could also cut the risk in black women by about 30 per cent, says new research from Harvard.
The take home message is that higher consumption of wholegrains should be promoted based on research on wholegrain and lower risk of type 2 diabetes as well as other chronic diseases," said lead researcher Dr Rob van Dam.
The researchers, from Harvard School of Public Health, the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, and Boston University, said that it was not clear however if the results would also be observed and applicable to magnesium supplements.
These comments are based on results of the Black Women's Health Study, a prospective cohort that, for this study, involved 41,186 women with an average age of 39 years. Dietary assessment was performed using 68-item food frequency questionnaires, while incidence of diabetes was assessed every two years by questionnaire.
After eight years of follow-up 1,964 newly diagnosed cases of type 2 diabetes were documented by Dr van Dam and his co-workers.
Taking into account possible confounding factors like smoking status, BMI, alcohol consumption, age, parental history of diabetes, soft drink consumption, calcium intake, and several others, the researchers found that women with the highest intake of magnesium (average 244 mg per day) had a 35 per cent lower risk of type-2 diabetes than those with the lowest intake (about 115 mg per day).
Similar protective effects were also observed for wholegrain consumption, with women with the highest intake (one or more servings a day) associated with a 31 per cent lower risk of diabetes that women who ate less than one serving a week.
"These findings indicate that higher consumption of magnesium-rich foods, particularly wholegrain products, is associated with a lower risk of type-2 diabetes in African-American women," wrote the researchers.
The potential mechanism of protection afforded by the magnesium-rich food, suggested the researchers, in on glucose control since magnesium can act as a co-factor for enzymes involved in the metabolism of glucose, or possibly on insulin secretion.
While the evidence appears to point towards the benefits of magnesium, Dr van Dam said: "Further well-conducted intervention studies are needed to elucidate whether magnesium per se can improve glucose homeostasis."
Dr van Dam confirmed that the researchers are continuing to look into the area of wholegrain consumption and diabetes.
"We are evaluating intake of wholegrain and its components in relation to risk of type 2 diabetes in other population as well as summarising the evidence from all research conducted on this topic," he said.
Convenience remains the driving force behind consumer purchasing decisions, despite the increased emphasis placed on health in the past year, according to the latest Eating Patterns in America report.
Published by the NPD Group, the latest report reveals that a growing need for easier meals is reflected by three driving consumer behaviours: an increased reliance on sandwiches at mealtimes, the use of fewer fresh ingredients, and more take-away lunches.
At the same time, though, health is not forgotten, with a majority of consumers saying they want to include more wholegrains, fibre, calcium and vitamin C in their diets.
"The driving force in our eating habits has always been convenience. The only surprise is how that will manifest in our behaviour," said Harry Balzer the group's vice president and author of the annual report Eating Patterns in America.
Over the past year, sandwiches, which have always been the most popular lunch food, have also become the number one main dish served at dinner-time in American homes. A little more than one out of every nine dinners (11.1 per cent) consumed in homes includes a sandwich. A sandwich is served a little more often than chicken (10.7 per cent).
Over more than half of 50,000 households choose their evening meal because it is easy to make, with 50 per cent saying it is because it takes little or no planning. Almost 40 per cent of respondents say they choose what to prepare based on the foods they have on-hand, while 35 per cent say the meal must be something liked by the whole family. Some cited the meal needed to be easy to clean-up after as a priority. The next most frequent response was: "looking for a healthy, nutritious meal", a priority that came surprisingly low down on the list.
While sandwiches are increasingly chosen at dinner, these are slowly losing their place to take-away meals at lunchtime. Last year, 36 per cent of all lunches served in homes included a sandwich, which has been on a slow decline from 1990, when 45 per cent of all in-home lunches included a sandwich. Now, the average American home will bring home 13 lunches from a restaurant per year, compared to 8 in 1990.
"While the frequency is still low, this is a reflection of a bigger issue: How do we make fresh foods easier? I think we're saying, 'Let the restaurant operator worry about having fresh bread, fresh tomatoes, fresh lettuce, fresh meat,' " said Balzer.
While 92 per cent of Americans agree that it is important for food to be fresh when it is bought, what people say and what they do are not one and the same, reveals the report.
Last year, nearly half (47 per cent) of in-home main meals included at least one fresh product. That has been slowly declining from 56 per cent, noted in NPD's first Eating Patterns in America report in 1985.
"It's a huge hassle for us to shop, keep, use, and clean up fresh foods. It's no surprise to me that there is growing interest around the country in 'meal assembly' centres. The real advantage of these places is that they do all the purchasing, storing, planning, preparing, and clean up of fresh foods," said Balzer.
However, despite the growing focus on convenience, health is certainly not forgotten, with Americans constantly looking for the latest way to address their health and food safety issues.
In 2006, 64 per cent of adults said they wanted to get more wholegrains in their diets, followed by 58 per cent wanting to add more dietary fibre, 58 per cent wanting more calcium, and 55 per cent wanting more Vitamin C.
And 71 per cent of adults also said they wanted to cut down on fat in their diets, followed by 62 per cent wanting to cut down on calories, 62 per cent wanting less cholesterol, and 59 per cent wanting less sugar.
When it comes to nutrition labels, 49 per cent of adults claim to look for total calories, compared to 47 per cent who look for total fat, 41 per cent who look for sugars, and 37 per cent who look for calories from fat.
"But healthy eating will take hold when it is either easier or cheaper to do than what we do now," according to the report.
Eating Patterns in America is not published to the public.
The Food Regulation Ministerial Council was due to make its final decision on a recommendation by the food safety body FSANZ that folic acid should be added to bread to reduce the number of birth defects in newborn babies.
But in a joint communiqué, ministers from both countries said that the food standards body would give the proposal further review and report back to the council in six months time.
"Food Standards Australia New Zealand has been asked to review the proposed standard due to technical considerations with the implementation of the standard, and compliance issues," said the statement.
Folic acid has been proven to reduce the risk of neural tube defects such as spina bifida, which affect about 75 babies born each year in New Zealand.
However the proposal has been strongly opposed by both large bakers and smaller firms, especially organic bakeries. The baking industry claims the proposal ignores both; current information on women's diets, as well as adequate knowledge of the risks to others in the population from consuming more folic acid.
There is some evidence to show that folic acid could mask deficiency of other B vitamins in the elderly and there are also fears of the effects of large amounts of folic acid in young children.
Meanwhile organic bakers say that they cannot add a synthetic vitamin to their products that are by definition free of all additives.
A range of industry representatives have therefore lobbied against the fortification proposal. The food regulation council confirmed however that all members at the Sydney meeting reinforced their commitment to the folic acid plan.
Researchers from Europe have found that the food industry does not understand how nutrition information labels on food actually influence buying behaviour in the supermarket.
Professor Klaus Grunert, who conducted the study on behalf of the European Food Information Council (EUFIC), said there is still virtually no insight into how labelling information is used in a real-world shopping situation, and how this will affect consumers dietary patterns.
"It is interesting that despite the wealth of information available on consumer opinions gathered from surveys, interviews and focus groups, there is an obvious lack of field research on this," he said.
"Understanding on-pack nutrition information in isolation is very different from understanding what this information means in the context of a weekly shopping excursion or composing a balanced diet."
EUFIC's assessment on the provision of nutritional information was compiled from consumer opinions from 58 different European studies carried out since 2003. The findings were presented at the 1st World Congress of Public Health Nutrition.
In addition, what was clear from the review was that, although consumers are almost unanimous in wanting simplified information on the front of food packs, they differ in their liking for various formats.
These include health logos, 'traffic lights', GDA-based (Guideline Daily Amounts) systems and energy labels.
Differences can be related to conflicting preferences for ease of use, being fully informed, and not being pressurised into behaving in a particular way. For example, EUFIC found that many consumers like colour coding, but some regard reds and greens on food products as too coercive.
"The review shows that there are three basic factors that determine what consumers like about nutrition information on label; simplicity, complete information and the freedom to make their own choice without coercion," said EUFIC's director general Dr Josephine Wills.
"Together, these factors are clearly incompatible, which is why different consumer profiles ascribe different priorities to each factor. This is reflected in some consumers preferring GDAs, some health logos and others colour-coded traffic light indicators."
This debate is currently being carried out in member states between the food industry, pressure groups and regulatory bodies. The traffic light scheme for example, designed to provide at-a-glance information on whether a food is high, medium or low in total fat, sugar and salt (with red, yellow or green stickers), is supported by bodies such as the UK's Food Standards Agency (FSA).
It claims that this system performs best for the majority of consumers at showing the key nutritional characteristics of a food simply and easily.
"Consumers have told us that they would like to make healthier choices but find the current information confusing," said Food Standards Agency (FSA) chair Deirdre Hutton.
However, the Food and Drink Federation (FDF) believes that new guideline daily amounts (GDAs) on food packaging is the best means of empowering consumers with vital nutritional knowledge. Food manufacturers and retailers, along with the Institute of Grocery Distribution (IGD), issued a voluntary code of GDAs earlier this year in a clear attempt to pre-empt the FSA's traffic light scheme.
In Australia, a new system of labelling foods unveiled by a group of Australian food manufacturers recently is designed to help consumers understand how much of their daily energy requirements will be met by a specific food or beverage.
The food manufacturers, represented by the Australian Food and Grocery Council, say the scheme is a 'major initiative … that will make an important contribution towards addressing obesity'.
The voluntary Percent Daily Intake scheme, which has been backed by firms like Kraft, Nestle, Unilever, Kellogg and Coca-Cola,
The food manufacturers' move to a voluntarily labelling scheme is seen as a pre-emptive strike against a mandatory one but it has gained the approval of the Federal Minister for Agriculture, Peter McGauran, and the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Health and Ageing, Christopher Pyne.
Food manufacturers say it is a better system than the colour-coded, or 'traffic light' labelling currently being tested in the UK, which would discriminate against high-fat foods like cheese that provide other important nutrients.
"The industry is working to avoid the confusion that has occurred in the UK and Europe, as a result of consumers being confronted with as many as 28 different logos and formats," said Minister McGauran.
Food manufacturers in Australia are under just as much pressure as their counterparts in Europe and the US as the country faces escalating obesity levels, particularly among children. The number of overweight or obese children has doubled since 1985, and now affects 23 per cent of all of those under the age of 16.
Barley and rye are underutilised wholegrains, and although they are considered to be minor cereal grains they have major health benefits, heard food scientists and manufacturers last week.
Speaking at the World Grains Summit in San Francisco, Elizabeth Arndt from ConAgra (a US based food retailer) said that in an environment where wholegrains are becoming increasingly popular, barley and rye could be used to add variety to new wholegrain foods.
"More than 70 percent of the grains we consume are wheat-based. Wholegrain consumption is very low, with people on average consuming less than one serving of wholegrains per day; only 9 per cent of children are consuming the recommended three servings of wholegrains every day. The message we need to get across is: make half of your grains whole," said Arndt.
Arndt said that incorporating more barley and rye into food and beverage products holds a number of benefits for food manufactures and consumers alike.
For food processing, these include functional benefits in terms of flavour, colour and texture. The two cereals are also particularly hardy, adaptable grains, said Arndt, and are more tolerant of adverse conditions, such as dry or cold atmospheres.
Wholegrain rye and barley also deliver key nutrients to consumers, she said.
Although far above the amounts currently consumed, three servings of wholegrain rye per day would provide 28 per cent of recommended daily amounts of fibre, 15 per cent magnesium, 4 per cent potassium, 25 per cent selenium and 60 per cent manganese. In addition, this amount of rye would provide up to 10 per cent of the recommended daily values of copper, iron, thiamin, niacin, folate, vitamin B6 and riboflavin.
The term 'wholegrain' is also considered to be more consumer-friendly than the term 'fibre', which leads some manufacturers to favour it on product packaging since it is likely to strike more of a chord of recognition for its healthy benefits.
According to Arndt, ConAgra's barley variety contains at least 30 per cent dietary fibre, of which more than 40 per cent is soluble fibre and is suitable for use in products such as cereals, baked goods, soups and beverages, has undergone a number of studies that have revealed its health benefits, said Arndt.
These include lowered blood glucose and insulin responses, lower absorption levels with implications for weight management, and increased satiety. The product is also marketed for its antioxidant levels, with an antioxidant capacity below artichokes and blueberries, but above strawberries, raisins and spinach.
Traditionally, barley has been used in products such as beer, teas and soup, while rye is primarily used for breads, crackers and alcoholic drinks. Additional applications that barley and rye can be used in include breakfast foods, cereals, tortillas, vegetarian patties and smoothies.
A genetically modified wheat variety that has significantly more resistant starch than regular wheat could reach the market in five years, say Australian scientists who have won financial backing to commercialise the crop.
A new joint venture involving French cereals group Limagrain and Australia's Grains Research and Development Corporation (GRDC) will invest $12.5 million in the project run by the Australian research body CSIRO.
CSIRO has been working on new, healthier wheat varieties for several years and in March announced that it had increased the amylose levels in a new variety from about 25 to 70 per cent. Amylose, or resistant starch, takes longer for the body to digest and therefore releases sugars more slowly.
Research suggests that slower sugar release reduces the risk of developing type 2 diabetes. Resistant starch is also though to be beneficial for the bowel and CSIRO scientists say the new wheat will play a crucial role in reducing bowel cancer occurrence.
However a market launch will depend heavily on consumer acceptance of a genetically modified ingredient. Dr Bruce Lee, director of the Food Futures team that has developed the new wheat, says there are signs of growing acceptance.
"We're seeing signs, especially in the US, that things are beginning to change. GM corn is being more widely accepted in foods. And we think that the health benefit [of the new wheat] will help to drive its acceptance," he said.
The high-amylose wheat could be added as wholegrain into breads, cereals, biscuits and other snacks.
"In our research on another GM product we found that consumers are willing to accept these ingredients particularly if they're fed indirectly, i.e., through a feed for livestock, and generally if they're offering a health benefit too," he said.
A study by ACNielsen on 1400 consumers seems to support this finding. It found that while 54 per cent of people said they were not likely to eat GM foods, when the question was asked in terms of the actual GM foods that are available, their responses changed.
48 per cent of respondents said they were likely to eat packaged food containing a small amount of a GM ingredient such as GM soy or GM canola, and 48 per cent stated they were likely to eat GM cooking oils.
The group is however also developing a non-GM variety, and says it "already has all the tools to bring this to market". The use of gene technology allowed the researchers to define the genetic changes in wheat required to boost amylose levels, and with this knowledge the team can breed the wheat using conventional methods.
However the GM variety will be quicker to reach and the market and Dr Lee says that its health benefits justify the decision to focus on this one first.
The new wheat will be marketed by Limagrain, through its biotech subsidiary Biogemma, in Europe. The joint venture has yet to decide on how it will be marketed in other regions.
If the strategy goes to plan, the high amylose wheat could be one of the first GM food crops available with a direct benefit for consumers. The researchers say the new wheat could also result in cost savings for food processors as they can avoid having to add extra fibre, a step increasingly taken by food manufacturers to boost the nutritional value of their products.
"The development of high amylose wheat varieties will also be good for farmers," added Terry Enright, chairman of the GRDC.
"New value-added varieties will provide the Australian grains industry with the opportunity to market differentiated high-value niche grains in both domestic and foreign markets."
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