Synopsis

Increased understanding of the relationships among food, diet, and nutrition is critical if Americans are to achieve optimal health and decrease their health care costs. The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services 1992 report, Healthy People 2000, calls for significant reductions in the incidence of obesity, anemia, premature births, growth retardation, and osteoporosis. These conditions can be mitigated by improvements in the American diet.

Enhancing the safety and quality of foods requires continued innovation in production and processing practices. Current production and manufacturing technologies and the scope and complexity of the food chain pose new challenges and opportunities for ensuring the safety and quality of foods.

If future research is to support the achievement of health goals, it must include increased use of innovative methodologies to explore human nutrient metabolism and the regulation of energy metabolism to control body weight. In addition, expanded investigations will be needed on topics such as the relationship of nutrients to gene regulation and expression, role of food choice in promoting optimal health, behavioral aspects of food choice and demand, use of biotechnology to increase the nutritive value of food and retard spoilage after harvest, development of technologies to monitor and maintain product quality, and the impact of food labeling and other nutrition education initiatives on consumer food choice. Food safety issues will continue to generate need for research, both to respond to public concerns and to provide policy-makers with scientific data as a basis for sound, reasoned judgments. As new and creative foods, including those resulting from bioengineering, become more common, continuing research will be needed to assess the complex interactions of food components as they relate to health.

Southern Synopsis The Southern Region has a high proportion of low income groups with poor diets, who have higher rates of diet related diseases such as high blood pressure, strokes, diabetes, and other diseases associated with obesity than does the general population. The lowest levels of education and family income in the United States occur in the South. The region leads the nation in the number of teenage mothers, children born with below average birth weight, and infant mortality. The Southern Region will be greatly affected by the North American Free Trade Agreement due to the vast assortment of food and food products that will move through the region. This means international standards of food safety and quality issues, such as definitions of organic food, acceptable levels of residues, and sanitary issues, must be addressed and improved. The changing structure of Southern families and the increasing diversity of the region s population intensifies nutrition and health issues. With the advent of NAFTA, there will be an even greater change of ethnic diversity with related needs for nutritional guidelines. The proportion of the elderly in the population will increase in the Southern Region even more rapidly than in the country as a whole as retired people move to milder climates. There are serious gaps in knowledge of nutrient requirements for the elderly.

Base Program Dynamics

Research on human nutrition is moving past studies of nutrient requirements into studies to define the impact of nutrition on quality of life. There is growing recognition of the importance of defining nutritional needs with respect to dietary habits of various ethnic groups and income strata. Research is moving into the molecular level to examine the dynamics of nutrient-gene interactions.

Research on food safety and human nutrition establishes criteria for improving the composition and processing of food and food products, described in the more general cross-cutting issue.

ENHANCE FOOD SAFETY

• Risk Management
• Next Generation of Foods
• Food Safety
• Integrated Pest Management
• Global Competitiveness

Impact
The goal of food safety research is to prevent foodborne disease, reduce the costs resulting from those diseases and strengthen the base of scientific knowledge relative to the establishment of standards and tolerances. Safety of the food supply is of paramount concern to consumers, policy-makers, distributors, processors, producers, and input suppliers. The Centers for Disease Control estimates that more than 6 million cases of foodborne illness resulting in 8,000 deaths occur each year, at a total cost of about $5 billion. The role of foodborne microorganisms and natural and manmade chemicals in chronic diseases, such as arthritis, diarrhea, and cancer, remains undetermined. Research is needed to better identify the causes and costs of foodborne diseases and to improve methods for their detection, assessment, and control.

Southern Relevance Geographic and climatic factors unique to the Southern Region must be considered in assuring the safety of food and food products produced in the region. For example, mycotoxins and pathogenic microorganisms, which can be prevalent in food and feed grains, pose a threat to the food supply under certain growing conditions in the region. The region is the nation s leader in producing poultry, specialized processed red meat products, certain dairy products, acquacultural products, vegetables, and fruits. Minimizing the potential for contamination of these products through adequate production and processing methods is a high priority for the region.

Objectives

• Identify causes of foodborne disease. Determine the microbiological and chemical causes, prevalence and incidence, and financial and health impacts of acute and chronic foodborne disease.

• Monitor exposure. Develop new, rapid, improved, cost-effective methods for detecting hazardous microorganisms and chemicals in foods and establish data bases and estimation methodologies to quantify exposure to all segments of the population.

• Improve hazard assessment. Develop improved science-based methods to assess the hazards posed by typical and exceptional exposures to chemical and microbiological components of foods and to assess differential risks among selected populations, including infants, children, the elderly, pregnant and lactating women, and people who have allergies, enzyme-deficiencies, or compromised immune systems.

• Prevent foodborne disease. Devise integrated control systems and new methods and technologies for controlling microbiological and chemical hazards associated with foods throughout the preharvest, postharvest, and consumption segments of the food chain.

• Investigate public communication methods. Investigate methods for accurately and effectively communicating information about foodborne disease hazards to the public to provide a research base for educational initiatives.

TARGET OPTIMAL NUTRITION FOR INDIVIDUAL HEALTH

• Risk Management
• Next Generation of Foods
• Food Safety

Impact
Optimal nutrition enables people to achieve their genetic potential, feel their best, and decrease their susceptibility to disease. Better health through improved nutrition can increase Americans quality of life, productivity, and learning potential and can reduce health care costs. Costs associated with the four major chronic diseases which are linked to inappropriate diet now exceed $150 billion annually.

Research is needed to determine the optimal nutrient intakes for people from all subpopulations and the role of dietary factors in the development and prevention of obesity and chronic diseases. Research to determine the relationships between diet and genetic regulation and between diet and fitness on health is required to establish nutrient needs of individuals.

Underlying the research objectives is a continued need to better understand the function of individual nutrients and naturally occurring protectants in foods and their interactions, and to develop reliable indicators of nutritional status and health. New methodologies, including those in molecular and cellular biology, have the potential to create new and more reliable indicators of nutrient status and predictors of nutrient needs. This research can be used by agricultural producers, food processors, and manufacturers to enhance the value of foods; by policy-makers to establish nutrition guidelines; and by nutrition educators to initiate efforts to improve nutritional status.

Southern Relevance Poor diets in the Southern region contribute to the highest rates in the nation of hypertension, strokes, diabetes, and other diseases associated with poor nutrition. Better definition of proper nutrition within ethnic and other cultural dietary patterns is needed to increase the longevity and quality of life in the South, as well as to reduce health care costs of the region.

Objectives

• Determine the role of diet in obesity and eating disorders. Determine the role of dietary intake in energy balance, weight control, obesity, and eating disorders.

• Investigate diet-health relationships. Increase understanding of the role of diet in maintaining and enhancing health and reducing the occurrence and progression of chronic diseases, such as cardiovascular disease, cancer, and osteoporosis.

• Establish optimal nutrition for diverse populations. Determine nutrition for optimal health and performance for diverse populations during critical stages of the life cycle, including infancy, youth, pregnancy, lactation, and advanced age.

• Determine nutrient-gene interactions. Elucidate the dynamics among nutrients, dietary components, and genetic regulation.

• Examine diet-exercise relationships. Define the interaction of diet and fitness to optimize health and performance.

DESIGN FOODS FOR HEALTHY DIETS

• Risk Management
• Next Generation of Foods
• Food Safety

Impact
Manipulating existing foods and designing new foods can help improve Americans growth and productivity and reduce their susceptibility to disease. The design and use of foods to modify the intake and proportions of nutrients people consume can influence their cell growth, metabolism, and/or function of the immune system. Better understanding of essential and non-essential compounds within foods, including their content in the food supply, bioavailability, and roles and interactions in nutrition, will provide a basis for developing foods tailored to individual needs. Creating novel foods using modified constituents, such as fat substitutes, offers additional means for developing and using agricultural products. Research is needed, however, to determine the maximum quantity of modified dietary constituents that can be safely eaten and to evaluate the processes used to develop novel foods. New technologies applied to agricultural products offer unprecedented opportunities to respond to consumer demands for healthy diets.

Southern Relevance Ethnic foods with adequate/desirable nutritional characteristics and affordable cost need to be developed. New food products can be developed from specialty crops in the Southern Region. Ethnic foods for the Southern population that have a high nutritional quality and safety can be exported to other countries.

Objectives

• Develop data for food design. Determine the bioavailability, nutrient interactions, and the impact of food processing to develop the data base needed to design novel foods.

• Determine the function and need for specific macro- and micro-constituents in the diet that affect human growth, development, and disease prevention and amelioration.

• Develop new processing methods. Develop new production and processing technologies to incorporate beneficial constituents and to reduce adverse constituents in foods.

• Assess new foods. Determine the safety, acceptability, efficacy, and nutritional consequences of new and novel foods as they are developed.

PROMOTE HEALTHY FOOD CHOICES

• Synergy at the Agriculture-Urban Interface
• Risk Management
• Next Generation of Foods
• Food Safety

Impact
Changing consumer demographics, family structures, and lifestyles, coupled with an expanding array of available products, have had dramatic impacts on food choices. Better understanding the role of consumer food choices and demand is a necessary step in effectively promoting optimal health through improved nutrition. The economic and behavioral obstacles to adopting healthy food habits consistent with U.S. dietary guidelines and the food guide pyramid must be identified. Complete and current information to monitor food composition and food intake is needed as a basis for effective nutrition policies and food assistance programs.

Southern Relevance Because of the many low-income families in the South, affordable food options are needed to help modify their poor dietary habits. The impact of diverse ethnic and cultural backgrounds and reduced educational levels, all of which influence dietary habits, must be understood and modified. New and more effective methods for consumer awareness and commitment to healthy diets and lifestyles must be developed.

Objectives

• Assess food intake patterns. Assess the impact of food and nutrient intake patterns on dietary adequacy and nutritional status. Improve the methodological tools and data bases available for assessing food intake, dietary adequacy, and nutritional status.

• Identify food choice factors. Improve the understanding of how food preferences and behaviors are learned; identify how socioeconomic, demographic and cultural factors, age, nutrition knowledge, attitudes, food preferences, and product characteristics influence food choices.

• Identify obstacles to appropriate food choice. Identify economic and other obstacles that prevent low-income populations from adopting healthy food choices and evaluate alternative means to overcome these obstacles.

• Develop effective nutrition education strategies. Develop and test strategies to educate consumers about healthy food choices and to identify factors that keep people from acting on their nutrition knowledge to adopt desirable dietary practices.