WE’RE not eating enough fruit and vegetables, according to the latest findings from Roy Morgan Research.
The survey found only two per cent of the Australia population aged over 14 ate two serves of fruit and five serves of vegetables each day, despite this being the minimum daily fruit-and-veg intake recommended by the National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC).
The data also found that in those who didn’t eat enough fruit and vegetables, daily serves vary dramatically depending on factors such as age, gender and socio-economic status.
Vegetables are where most Australians fall short with more than 60 per cent of the population eating just two or less serves each day, and only six per cent eating five or more serves.
Women tend to eat more servings than men, and Australians aged 50 and over are generally more likely than their younger counterparts to eat three or more serves each day.
But even though people aged 65 and over are the most zealous vegie-eaters, a mere eight per cent of them eat the recommended five serves each day.
People from the lowest socio-economic quintile (FG) also tend to eat fewer daily serves of vegetables, being less likely than the average Australian to eat more than a serve and more than twice as likely to eat no vegetables per day.
In contrast to their insufficient vegetable intake, Australians do much better at eating more than enough fruit.
Thirty-three percent of women and 28 per cent of men eat their recommended two serves of fruit each day, and 18 per cent of men and 20 per cent of women eat more than that.
Roy Morgan Research group account director Angela Smith said the NMHRC’s message of two fruit and five veg every day has been widely promoted but very few Australians manage to eat enough.
“Compared with the ease of eating two pieces of fruit a day, eating five serves of vegetables isn’t always so straightforward,” she said.
“Coming up with and preparing creative, tasty vegie-centric meals takes time – all that chopping! It’s a far cry from Australia’s long-standing meat-and-two-veg culinary tradition (although our increasingly multicultural population is changing this).
“Overall, young married parents are among the least likely segments of the population to get their ‘two-and-five’, which is cause for concern, as it suggests that their kids are probably missing out too.”
