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Real Food Challenge Learning Module

Maria Frank, Author

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Nutrition

Nutrition is a concept of great concern when discussing the food system, which can be used in conversations about...
  • Production
    • As in soil (or fertilizer) nutrients in soil or nutrients in animal feed
  • Consumption
    • As in nutrients in food or supplements
The importance of providing good nutrition often comes up in discussions about school lunch programs; for example, in Adequacy of Federal School Lunch Reimbursement Adjustments, milk, produce, meat and meat alternatives, and bread are described as "key components in providing balanced, nutritious school lunches" and in particular, "whole grains and a variety of fruits and vegetables" are "categories that are crucial to providing healthier meals."
        Note that healthy and balanced are words often used as synonyms of the adjective nutritious.
This same source is particularly concerned with the cost of nutritious food, another common theme in conversations around food, along with accessibility.

A Science Roadmap for Food and Agriculture, for example, contributes to the conversation about how to enhance nutrition, health, and wellness. It suggests that these can be improved through food "technologies and breeding programs," and that nutrition plays a role with lifestyle "in preventing, mitigating, or treating obesity and chronic diseases, including diabetes, arthritis, and certain cancers."

Hunger is a term related to nutrition, which can mean
  • a chronic lack of sufficient nutrition, leading to compromised health
  • a physical sensation signaling the necessity to eat
    • in contrast to appetite: a desire to eat that is triggered by emotions, social cues, personal taste, habit, etc.

Functional foods are sometimes used to enhance nutrition. A Science Roadmap for Food and Agriculture defines them as "Foods that contain, or are 'engineered' to contain, enhanced nutrition, such as one or more compounds that are beneficial to human health."

Related terms: health, food and; functional foods; healthy food; junk food; fast food; diet; whole grain
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