By L.K. Hewlett
St. Kitts Reporter
Participants from across the English speaking Caribbean attended a Food and Nutrition Security training course in St. Kitts this week.
The course was a collaborative effort between the Technical Centre for Agriculture and Rural Co-operation (CTA), Caribbean Food and Nutrition Institute (CFNI) and the Caribbean Agricultural Research and Development Institute (CARDI).
Minister of Health Honourable Rupert Herbert and Minister of Agriculture Honourable Cedric Liburd were on hand to address the trainees during the opening ceremony held on Tuesday at the Frigate Bay Resort. The Ministers were joined by CARDI representative Llewellyn Rhodes, CARDI Board of Directors Chairman Dr. Keith Archibald, CARDI Information Resource Manager Claudette de Freitas and Food Economist Dr Ballayram.
Dr. Ballayram explained that over the years food security had advanced in terms of its concept and vision. He said “food security means that people should have physical access to food and that it must be available.”
“Food must contribute to a healthy life. In this context food security has four main components chief of which is that food must be available. Two, people must have the ability to access the food through good income and reasonable prices. Of course the food distribution network must also contribute to food being available. Three, people must choose the food that would contribute to healthy lifestyles. They must choose food from the six food groups and contain the amount of fats, sugars and salts whilst increasing vegetable consumption. Stability is the final component, referring to gluts, shortages or times when people don’t have the resources to buy the food,’ he said.
The main objective of the course, he said, was to train persons working in the area of food and within the health sector how to utilise communication tools to articulate the message that people must learn how to choose foods to maintain healthy lifestyles.
Liburd noted that he served as an example of how persons could change their diet o live healthier lives, having to do so himself after recently undergoing surgery.
“I am in full support of this workshop and I would like to compliment Minister Herbert and his ministry for carrying programmes to our people that promote good health and nutrition. After having surgery just recently, the hospital dietician told me that I could no longer eat the way I used to. She said I had to cut down on the amount of rice and some other things that I ate. Since then I have lost twenty pounds. I am looking forward to you getting this message out in order for our people to understand that there is need for some changes in their lifestyle,” he said.
Minister Herbert welcomed the regional participants and commended the organisations involved in organising the workshop saying that the course was timely.
“Since I was going to school, I was told to eat well and I can recall vividly that because of poverty, my mother had to sell eggs to be able to buy bread to feed her family. We were actually getting rid of the more nutritious food to buy a food which was more filling but less nutritious. These practices have come down through the ages but of course the message was always there. My ministry has been prominent in disseminating the message of healthy eating and lifestyles but like in many other messages, we tend to think it is falling on deaf ears. That is the reason we need to develop new tools and methods of communicating that message throughout our region,” he said.
Herbert recalled an article in a magazine that listed St. Kitts as one of the countries where the incidents of nutrition related cancers and mortalities were very high. He said he was further alarmed to read that the figures may not have changed significantly over time, because he believes that their efforts must be bearing some fruit.
“We are concerned these days with chronic non-communicable diseases and we’ve made the link between theses diseases and good or bad nutrition. It is important that people eat healthy, especially in these times when the modern trend is fast food, snacking and lots of food. We even encourage our children because of convenience of time. The link between these types of eating habits and chronic non-communicable diseases, productive capacity of the workers of this country and the impact on health budgets is evident. Let us use every opportunity to upgrade the methods by which we send out this message. I wish that in this workshop, we will have fruitful deliberations and that at the end of the day when you return to your respective countries and jobs you will be better equipped to send out the message that good nutrition is the basis upon which you can build economic progress and a better life,” the health minister concluded.
