Time trends in consumption pattern of dietary fats among population in India

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N Arlappa, N Balakrishna, R Harikumar, II Meshram, K Mallikharjuna Rao, Sharad Kumar, M Ravindranath, K S Ramakrishna, G Manohar Reddy and A
Laxmaiah

National Institute of Nutrition -ICMR, India

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Abstract

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Introduction: Rapid nutrition transition is taking place worldwide, especially in developing and underdeveloped countries. As a part of it, there was an increased demand for domestic production and import of oilseeds and vegetable oils from other counties. Consequently, there is a marked increase in consumption of edible oils in India populations; from 31.4 g/d/capita in 1993–1994 to 41.6 g/d/capita in 2011–2012. In India, vegetable oils used in cooking represent 80% of the visible fat and there has been a shift from traditional groundnut oil to other oils such as palmolein, mustard, sunflower oils and increased consumption of ghee. Objective: The objective of this communication is to study the trends in consumption pattern of Fats and Oils among Indian population. Materials & Methods: National Nutrition Monitoring Bureau (NNMB) has been carrying out large scale community based crosssectional studies in rural, tribal and urban areas of different States of India, covering two-thirds of its geographical area. The latest surveys carried out by the NNMB and other organisation on diet and nutritional status of rural, tribal and urban areas was utilised for this communication. Use of different cooking oils and consumption patterns of visible and total fats obtained through 24-hour recall diet survey among the rural and tribal populations by age group, literacy status and occupation was analysed and presented. Results: Majority of households in India were using mustard oil for cooking purpose followed by groundnut, palm oil, soybean oil, coconut and sunflower oil. In general, at household level, the intakes of visible fats are less than RDI (20 gr), and the deficit intake of total fat was >50% of RDA during three time points among tribal and rural population. Similarly, the intake of total fat was grossly deficit against the RDA (40 mg) across all the age groups and genders. Likewise, the mean household intakes of visible fats were below the RDIs among urban populations. However, the adequacy (≥70% of RDA) of consumption of fats was higher among the adults (≥18 years) as compared to adolescents and children. Conclusions: In general, the dietary consumption visible fats as well as total fats were grossly deficit among tribal, rural and urban population of India.

Biography

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N Arlappa has completed his MD in Community Medicine from the NTR University of Medical Sciences, Vijayawada, India. He has been working as Nutrition Scientist in the Division of Community Studies, National Institute of Nutrition (NIN), Indian Council of Medical Research, Hyderabad, India. He has 20 years of research experience in the field of Public Health Nutrition and has published more than 60 scientific papers in peer-reviewed national and international journals. He has published 4 book chapters and one book on vitamin A and has completed more than 40 research studies and published more than 250 technical reports out of them. He attended and presented more than 25 scientific papers in national and international conferences/workshops. He is the faculty of the courses of MPH (NIE), MSc (Nutrition) and PG Certificate course in Applied Nutrition, conducted at NIN. He is currently serving as Deputy Director (Scientist-E).

Email: arappan@yahoo.com