WHAT THE WORLD EATS

Evening Post, Issue 66, 15 September 1936, Page 8

WHAT THE WORLD EATS

The part played by diet in what Mr. Wells calls "the work, wealth, and happiness of mankind" is becoming increasingly recognised nowadays. No longer is it a case oi "early to bed and early to rise makes a man healthy, wealthy, and wise"; the present generation wants to know what a man eats and drinks before it will venture an opinion on the reasons for his Avorldly condition, in its widest sense. Mr. Bernard Shaw eats no meat and has attained both great age and great fame and fortune. Mr. John D. Rockefeller, sen., has reached his ninety-seventh birthday on a strict dietary and regular habits, but he still eats a little meat. Centenarians may be found who have never—so they say—followed a strict regime in diet or anything else. Doctors are said to differ on the point, but there is a growing interest everywhere in the food we consume and the method of its preparation, as witness the eager controversy over the remarks of the Mayor of Wellington on cookery in New Zealand. On lop of this we are informed by a cable message

today from' London that "the fourth League of Nations volume, published under the guidance of the nutrition committee reveals that British Empire countries are the largest meat-eaters" and that New Zealand heads the list with an annual per capita consumption of 2361b, nearly twice that of Denmark and more than twice that of Germany.

Is there any conclusion to be drawn from these figures? If there were any connection, say, between militarism and meat —as some say there is—then we might expect Nuremberg outbursts here rather than.in Germany. On the other hand, Denmark, so sparingly carnivorous, is the world's leading sweet-tooth, while New Zealand is not even mentioned in the ranks of sugar consumers, though this may be an oversight. But it is a fact that Switzerland consumes twice as much milk per head as New Zealand, and on the virtues of milk in the dietary there seems to be general agreement among the experts. Economically speaking, apart from any other "consideration, one might say that, with our meat exports fetching an excellent price and our dairy produce slumping somewhat on the London market, a little more attention to milk in trie New Zealand dietary would pay. "