OBESOGENIC ENVIRONMENT AND CHRONIC NON-COMMUNICABLE DISEASES: ANALYSIS OF EATING OUT OF THE HOME AND THE ROLE OF COLLECTIVE FEEDING IN REVERSING THE SCENARIO
Keywords:
Food Environment, Food, Beverages, Nutritional QualityAbstract
The food environment presents political, environmental, and individual factors that can directly influence individuals' eating habits. The high availability of foods classified as ultra-processed are important stimuli for the development of an "obesogenic" eating pattern, just as environments with greater availability of healthy foods encourage their consumption. Currently, we have a Westernized diet, characterized by the high consumption of ultra-processed foods, rich in fats and sugars, and nutritionally poor. Therefore, the objective of this research is to characterize the current obesogenic food environment by analyzing the barriers and facilitators of healthy eating. The results demonstrated the prevalent supply of ultra-processed foods and, conversely, the low supply of natural and minimally processed foods. Furthermore, considering the characteristics evaluated in the studies, the food environment lacks important information for promoting a healthy eating environment, such as the absence of nutritional information and the lack of encouragement for good eating habits. Furthermore, individual food choices are very complex and subject to numerous collective and individual influences, such as socioeconomic and psychosocial factors and the perceived nutritional environment. This demonstrates the need for actions and strategies by establishments to build a health-promoting food environment.
