The latter represent vitamins, minerals and trace elements, and while it is easy to cover your needs for proteins, lipids and carbohydrates, which represent macronutrients, it is not the same for micronutrients.
Indeed, current diet no longer allows us to meet the micronutrient needs of our body, and deficiencies are more and more frequent. For example, iron deficiency affects more than 30% of the world population according to the WHO, and the most common deficiencies in France concern magnesium, calcium, zinc, iron and vitamin D.
Why have we arrived at a diet that no longer fulfills all of its functions?
The causes are simple, and unfortunately once again of an anthropogenic nature. Three factors are mainly responsible for the depletion of nutrients in our foods:
- Cultivation methods: these have changed a lot in recent decades. They are more and more intensive, and we use more and more pesticides.
- Cooking habits: cooking, microwave, barbecue, blender, extractor... All these ways of cooking actually denature raw foods, and we observe significant losses in fiber and micronutrients.
- The choice of foods: and more particularly the appetite for ultra-processed products, which have an impoverished nutritional profile.
What is striking in our current society is the abundance of nutritional deficiencies, in a world where it has never been easier to have access to food. This can be explained by a lack of knowledge of the human body, its functioning and the nutrition necessary to make it function correctly, but also by this degradation of the nutritional quality of foods which has been occurring over recent decades.
Between 1950 and 2016, the levels of vitamin C in our fruits and vegetables were divided by 100, those of vitamin A by 21 and those of calcium by 4. Today's meat is half as rich in iron as in 1950.
According to a study, women aged 18 to 50 consuming an average of 1736 kcal per day would actually need 3272 kcal per day to meet their iron intake, and 4000 kcal per day to cover their vitamin E intake, and this difference is due to the nutritional impoverishment of our foods. Technically, we would have to make a choice between adequate micronutrient intakes and energy intakes that allow us to maintain a stable weight, which is obviously not sustainable.
How to overcome this? How to restore adequate intake?
#1 – Eat real food and limit processed foods.
This is the basis for finding a balance within your micronutrient intake; you must consume the products that contain it most naturally. Plates have changed considerably recently: the nutritional density, fiber and micronutrient intake of real foods have given way to the energy density, sodium, sugar and fat of processed foods. This is therefore the first lever to use. But as we have seen, even raw products have lost quality due to certain factors, so we have to play on these…
#2 – Consume organic products.
They will not have been impacted by harmful cultivation methods, and will not be degraded by pesticides. Their nutritional quality will therefore be higher. If this represents too high a cost, you can select the foods to buy organic as a priority: fruits and vegetables that are eaten with the skin, dairy products, olive oil, whole grains which contain the whole grain.
#3 – Be careful when preparing food!
Prefer gentle cooking, which less distorts the fibers and micronutrients: it is better to cook slowly and gently than to cook quickly and intensely. Also watch out for false friends: if smoothies are very fashionable, it will always be preferable to eat whole fruits, to preserve all of their nutritional quality.
#4 – Preserve your fruits and vegetables.
To benefit from all the benefits of fruits and vegetables, be careful to eat them at the right ripeness, keep them away from light and keep in mind that it is best to eat them with the skin on when possible. In fact, a large part of the vitamins and minerals are concentrated in the skin.
#5 – Consume food supplements
Often stigmatized, they are in fact essential in a society like ours, where food has become impoverished. They are of great help when they are of quality: pay attention to the dosage of the ingredients, the quality of the active ingredients, the associated controls, the evidence of effectiveness, and the origin of the ingredients.
It is difficult to navigate good eating habits as the subject is so vast, and sometimes we need a little help. At DIJO, we created DIETARY CONSULTATION , a session dedicated to your personal issues with a dietitian, to see things more clearly and find answers to your questions. Let's define together the objectives that will allow you to regain vitality, comfort and energy, through a healthy diet that leaves room for pleasure!
Sources:
[1] Mayer, A. (1997). Historical changes in the mineral content of fruits and vegetables. British Food Journal , Vol. 99 No. 6, p. 207-211. https://doi.org/10.1108/00070709710181540
[2] Davis DR, 2009. Declining fruit and vegetable nutrient composition: what is the evidence? Hortscience , 44, 15-19.
[3] Dangour AD, Dodhia SK, Hayter A, Allen E, Lock K, Uauy R. Nutritional quality of organic foods: a systematic review. Am J Clin Nutr . Sep 2009;90(3):680‑5.
