TEHRAN – The national campaign to promote healthy eating habits will kick off on December 6 and will run for over two weeks.

Held annually, the campaign aims to raise public awareness of the importance of healthy eating. Themed ‘health and bread’, this year’s campaign highlights the significance of consuming healthy bread, the health ministry reported.

Each day of the week will focus on a specific topic as follows.

Saturday, December 6, ‘Choosing healthy bread’

Sunday, December 7, ‘Healthy bread and family’

Monday, December 8, ‘Healthy bread and non-communicable diseases’

Tuesday, December 9, ‘Healthy bread and media’

Wednesday, December 10, ‘Healthy bread and policymakers’

Thursday, December 11, ‘Traditional bread and industrial bread’

Friday, December 12, ‘Healthy bread and its nutrients’

Saturday, December 13, 'Healthy bread and bakers'

Sunday, December 14,  ‘Healthy bread and people’s demand’

Monday, December 15, ‘Enriching bread’

Tuesday, December 16, ‘Healthy bread and ways to keep it’

Wednesday, December 17, ‘Bread waste in the country’

Thursday, December 18, ‘Healthy bread and its price’

Friday, December 19, ‘Healthy bread and women’s role’

Saturday, December 20, ‘Healthy bread and food industry'

Sunday, December 21, ‘Healthy bread and manufacturers’

Boosting nutrition literacy in rural areas

The health ministry is planning to improve nutrition literacy among people in rural communities to address nutritional health concerns in these regions.

Despite the high quality of food in rural areas, the lack of nutritional knowledge, which affects the choice of food for consumption, has highly affected the people, Mehr news agency quoted Ahmad Esmaeilzadeh, an official with the health ministry, as saying in January.

Malnutrition, in all its forms, including undernutrition (wasting, stunting, underweight), inadequate vitamins or minerals, overweight, and obesity, occurs among children in rural areas because some parents are ignorant about children’s nutrition, the official noted.

The prevalence of diabetes, high blood fat, and hypertension in villages is the second reason that necessitates the need for nutrition experts, he added.

The official went on to say that some 350 nutrition experts will start their work in rural areas by the end of the current Iranian year (March 2025).

The nutrition experts will promote nutrition literacy and consequently the health of people in villages, the official added.

It Is essential to raise people’s knowledge and awareness and train them to take care of themselves and prevent obesity and disease by eating healthy food and taking enough calories, as well as exercising for half an hour per day.

MT/MG