Lynn Ferguson - Nutrition & Health
Gordon Lees (who is always available for a chat anyway) has replaced himself with a top academic who brings a highly professional follow up to Mark Christensens' apple research from last years conference:
Lynn Ferguson - Nutrition & Health - Room 2, Sunday 11:00am
Head of Nutrition, Faculty of Medical & Health Sciences, The University of Auckland.
Nutrition is the major contributor to the common diseases of New Zealanders. The discipline looks at dietary affects on people’s health and how micronutrients, "nutriceuticals" and functional foods affect general health.
Lynn pointed out that we often overlook symptoms of poor nutrition like varicose veins, gout, dental health and allergies.
We probed into phytochemicals, mood foods such as chocolate, antioxidants of course and a suggestion to keep your polyphenol intake of red wine close to 2 servings of 100ml per day. While cogniceuticals lessen awareness problems, the importance of immunonutrition - feeding both your innate immune system and your adaptive immunity, was an essential consideration for everyone's good health. Fruit and veges to the rescue - eat more of them, in general. Men, 4 Brazil nuts per day provides prostate protection by providing the Selenium lacking in modern foods - among many other simple elements Lynn detailed as under-available in typical diets.
Essential also is exercise - go get your fresh food at every opportunity; kiwifuit, citrus and veges for vitamin C and many other nutriceuticals so many people suffer from a deficiency of. Cooked versus raw? - variety is what our body likes to be presented with, including amount of cooking, so it has a better chance of sourcing the nutrition it most needs.
Knowledgeable treecroppers present enhanced Lynn's fascinating presentation by emphasising the role of tree crops in this sometimes scary, somewhat willfully avoided topic.