Man has long been aware that correct nutrition is essential to health. Development and modernization offer a varied and abundant supply of foods to an increasing number of people. Without a proper cultural foundation or clear nutritional guidelines that can be applied and easily followed on a daily basis, individuals risk following unbalanced – if not actually incorrect – eating habits.
Erio Ziglio, head of the World Health Organization European Office for Investment for Health and Development in Venice, will open the seminar by talking about how health and social and economic development are closely related; Barbara Buchner, director of the Climate Policy Initiative in Venice and member of the advisory board of the Barilla Center for Food & Nutrition will illustrate the double version of the Food Pyramid. One that not only positions foods following the criteria nutritional science has long recommended based on their positive impact on health, but also in terms of their impact on the environment. The result is a “Double Pyramid”: the familiar Food Pyramid and an Environmental-Food Pyramid. The latter, placed alongside the Food Pyramid, is shown upside-down: foods with higher environmental impact are at the top and those with reduced impact are placed at the bottom. It can be seen from this “Double Pyramid” that those foods with higher recommended consumption levels are, in general, also those with lower environmental impact. Contrarily, those foods with lower recommended consumption levels are also those with a higher environmental impact. In other words, this newly-elaborated version of the Food Pyramid seems to illustrate, in a unified model, the coincidence of two different but highly-relevant goals: health and environmental protection.

Speakers
Barbara Buchner
Erio Ziglio