The Role of Functional Food Security in Global Health

Ronald Ross Watson, Ram B. Singh, Toru Takahashi

• Publisher: Academic Press
• Year: 2018
• Print ISBN: 9780128131480
• eBook ISBN: 9780128131497
• Topic: Technology & Engineering
• Subtopic: Food Science
• Index: Technology & Engineering

The Role of Functional Food Security in Global Health presents a collective approach to food security through the use of functional foods as a strategy to prevent under nutrition and related diseases. This approach reflects the views of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, the World Health Organization, the World Heart Federation and the American Heart Association who advise Mediterranean, Paleolithic, plant food based diets, and European vegetarian diets for the prevention of cardiovascular disease. In addition, the book also emphasizes the inclusion of spices, herbs and millets, as well as animal foods.This book will be a great resource to the food industry as it presents the most efficient ways to use technology to manufacture slowly absorbed, micronutrient rich functional foods by blending foods that are rich in healthy nutrients.- Provides greater knowledge on functional food security- Highlights the necessary changes to the western diet that are needed to achieve food security- Explains the utility and necessity of functional food security in the prevention of noncommunicable diseases- Presents policy changes in food production for farmers and the larger food industry- Offers suggestions on what can be done to enhance functional food production while simultaneously decreasing production costs

Section II

Evolutionary Diet, Western Diet and NCDS

Outline

• Chapter 5 Evolutionary Diet and Evolution of Man
• Chapter 6 Globalization of Diets and Risk of Noncommunicable Diseases
• Chapter 7 A Review on the Nutritional Challenges of School Children From the Perspective Developing Countries
• Chapter 8 Functional Food Security for Prevention of Obesity and Metabolic Syndrome
• Chapter 9 Functional Food Security for Prevention of Diabetes Mellitus
• Chapter 10 Functional Food Security for Prevention of Cardiovascular Diseases
• Chapter 11 Effects of Western Style Foods on Risk of Noncommunicable Diseases
• Chapter 12 Role of Food and Nutrition in Cancer
• Chapter 13 Low Protein Rice

Chapter 5

Evolutionary Diet and Evolution of Man

Lekh R. Juneja¹, Agnieszka Wilczynska², Ram B. Singh², Toru Takahashi³, Dominik Pella⁴, Sergey Chibisov⁵, Maria Abramova⁵, Krasimira Hristova⁶, Jan Fedacko⁷, Daniel Pella⁷ and Douglas W. Wilson⁸, ¹The Rohto Pharmaceutical Co. Ltd, Osaka, Japan, ²The Tsim Tsoum Institute, Krakow, Andrzej Frycz Modrzewski Krakow University, Krakow, Poland, ³Graduate School of Human Environment Science, Fukuoka Women’s University, Fukuoka, Japan, ⁴East Slovak Institute of Medical Sciences, Kosice, Slovakia, ⁵Faculty of Medicine, People’s Friendship University of Russia, Moscow, Russia, ⁶Department of Noninvasive Functional Diagnostic and Imaging, University National Heart Hospital, Sofia, Bulgaria, ⁷Faculty of Medicine, PJ Safaric University, Kosice, Slovakia, ⁸School of Medicine, Pharmacy and Health, Durham University, Durham, United Kingdom

Abstract

The evolutionary dietary patterns were characterized with wild plant foods, honey, egg, fish, and meat from running animals. The dietary intakes in Paleolithic Homo erectus, hunter-gatherers compared to Western populations, show significant differences which may be because of education, knowledge, and technological developments. With an increase in wealth and affluence, there is a decrease in the intake of omega-3 fatty acids, vitamins, antioxidants, and essential and nonessential amino acids and a significant increase in the intakes of refined carbohydrates, fat (saturated, trans fat, and linoleic acid), and salt compared to the Paleolithic period. The protein or amino acid intake was 2.5-fold greater (33% vs 13%) in the Paleolithic diet of Homo erectus compared to the modern Western diet. Prior to the Agricultural Revolution, our diet was based on an enormous variety of wild plants, eggs, fish, and seeds. However, today about 17% of plant species provide 90% of the world’s food supply which is mainly contributed by fertilizer-based rapidly grown crops of grains which may result in a decrease in nutrient density and increase in energy. The majority of the grains are high in omega-6 fatty acids and carbohydrates and low in omega-3 fatty acids and antioxidants compared to leafy green vegetables. The diets of Homo sapiens and Homo erectus populations were characterized by higher intakes of functional foods, high in protective nutrients such as potassium, magnesium, calcium, flavonoids, and omega-3 fatty acids as well as essential and nonessential amino acids. The modern Western diets are characterized with high saturated fat, omega-6 fat, and trans fat, and excess of energy-rich refined carbohydrates. Increased intake of such foods in lower-middle- and high-income countries in association with physical inactivity has been associated with an epidemic of cardiometabolic diseases and increased risk of death due to noncommunicable diseases.

Keywords

Diet; social class; functional foods; ancient diet; Mediterranean diet

Acknowledgments

The International College of Nutrition and International College of Cardiology are thanked for supporting this study.

5.1 Introduction

The human race has evolved from its primate precursors and from organized hunter-gatherers who were more skillful workers [1]. It seems that after the origin of man in Africa, nutrients played an important role in the evolution of man by the interaction of genes and epigenes with nutrients [2,3]. About 10,000 years ago, man began cultivation as an adaptation leading to a marked development in agricultural technology and food storage. It is likely that the social functions of most of the farming groups were limited to food collection, food production, and food storage as well as playing, singing, and dancing. These activities were beneficial for them, socially and physiologically [4–7]. Paleontological records indicate that Homo erectus and Homo habilis populations were consuming basically vegetarian foods [1–3]. The hunting groups developed gradually with the consciousness of space and time as man moved away from other primate species and learned tool making [1]. The naturally available foods during the Paleolithic period are included in the Paleolithic diet rich in wild foods: vegetables, green leaves, fruits, nuts, seeds, honey, eggs, and fish. The meat was from running animals which has protective fatty acids [6–10]. The preagricultural humans were also similar to hunter-gatherers who continue to collect such foods which form modern man’s genetic nutritional requirement. However, before hunter-gathering, early man also had good health due to enormous physical activity and natural food diversity with limited or no mental stress, alcoholism, and tobacco intake which are considered important risk factors of cardiovascular diseases (CVDs) and other chronic diseases. After 1910, increase in industrialization and urbanization led to refining and processing of foods, storing for commercialization for a better economic development [10–14]. The flavonoids and omega-3 fatty acids in the Japanese and the Mediterranean traditional diets appear to share a common standard ratio (omega-6/3 ~ 1/1) with the Paleolithic diet. However, diet and lifestyle in Japan showed marked changes from the 1950s to the 1980s as people became more affluent, without an increase in most CVDs [1]. This modern pattern of food availability, changes in lifestyle, and in political system, led by profit, translates into new opportunities and threats, as well as unprecedented challenges, for mankind in the whole of the Western world [14,15]. This review aims to find out the evidence of the evolution of diets and dietary transition in the light of human evolution.

5.2 Evolution of Man

It has been proposed that the origin of modern humans could be in the whole of Africa within the past 300,000–350,000 years. Humans may have evolved from their common ancestor, Homo erectus, which means “upright man” [4]. This extinct species of human lived between 1.9 million and 135,000 years ago. Homo sapiens, means “wise man” and our species is the only surviving species of the genus Homo sapiens but there is debate about wherefrom we came. The human evolution is explained by the “out of Africa” model or the “multiregional” model but the first one, is a widely accepted model [4]. It proposes that Homo sapiens evolved in Africa before migrating across the world. Recent findings of new fossils from Jebel Irhoud, from Morocco as well as the pan-African origin of Homo sapiens also support that human evolution took place over multiple preferred sites across the whole of Africa over a long period of time [4]. It is proposed that the preference for sites could be an adaptation for functional food nutrition to enhance the capability of its genome and epigenome [5].

It has been proposed that the evolutionary history of humans is written into their genome [5]. The human genome looks the way it does, because all the genetic changes t...

Table of contents

• Cover image
• Title page
• Table of Contents
• Copyright
• List of Contributors
• About the Editors
• Foreword
• Preface
• Editorial: Why Functional Food Security, Not Just Food Security
• Section I: World Population and Food Availability
• Section II: Evolutionary Diet, Western Diet and NCDS
• Section III: Fatty Acids in the Diet and NCDs
• Section IV: Western Type Foods
• Section V: Functional Foods in the Diet
• Section VI: Bee Products
• Section VII: Spices as New Functional Foods
• Section VIII: Nutrition, NCDs and Brain Dysfunction
• Section IX: Probiotics and Microbiome
• Index