BY UE STUDIO

Updated Tuesday,23May2023-17:28

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There is a close relationship between people's health and well-being, but it is not always easy or a priority to follow a balanced diet. The reasons why someone chooses one type or another of diet can be conditioned by geographical or socio-economic access barriers, as well as by a lack of knowledge or difficulty in making a change of habits.

At Grupo Dia, however, they are convinced that healthy eating should be available to everyone and have set themselves the goal of making it easier for people to eat better every day, no matter where they live or their budget.

Precisely for this reason, the raison d'être of the Eat Better Every Day program – which is the central axis of Dia's sustainability plan and its social cause at a global level in the four countries in which it operates (Spain, Argentina, Brazil and Portugal) – is that people can access varied and quality food and that they have the possibility of changing their eating habits.

Keys to healthy eating

A healthy diet allows you to obtain the necessary nutrients and energy, in a balanced and varied way, giving priority to fresh foods and moderating the consumption of processed foods, added sugars, saturated fats and sodium.

Fish is one of the main sources of minerals such as zinc or phosphorus, and vitamin A, B12 and folic acid.

However, eating balanced is not always easy and will depend on geographical, economic or sociocultural factors, such as the lack of food stores, especially in the most depopulated areas.

Dia has set itself the goal of working to help reduce the food gap and disseminate eating habits to reduce obesity and malnutrition

For Marián García, better known as Boticaria García, the keys to healthy eating are not in books or university classrooms. "A good diet starts in the shopping cart and you have to fill that cart from science. It is currently considered that the healthiest diet is the one that follows a pattern similar to that proposed by the Harvard Healthy Eating Plate, which suggests that half of the plate is made up of fruits and vegetables (the more varied the better), a quarter are cereals (preferably whole) and the remaining quarter is healthy protein (that which comes from birds, fish, eggs, legumes or nuts)".

A healthy diet allows you to obtain the necessary nutrients and energy in a balanced and varied way, giving priority to fresh foods.

So that families do not move away from balanced diets, he explains that it is essential that supermarkets have convenient alternatives, "such as healthy products of rapid preparation that, without a high cost, suppose a competitive incentive compared to other unhealthy fast food options".

A cause with real impact

Proximity distribution is at the heart of Dia's business. Therefore, among the 15 areas of work of its 2021-23 Sustainability Plan, accessibility to food is its priority axis. "It is our social cause," emphasizes Martín Tolcachir, Global CEO of Grupo Dia.

He adds that Dia is more than an essential service, it is another neighbor, and that thanks to the strength of its capillarity it has the opportunity and responsibility to facilitate that all people can eat better every day. "We are the neighborhood store that facilitates a complete purchase, easily and quickly. Close to home and online. With a wide, varied assortment, with great prominence of fresh products and local suppliers, as well as Dia brand products that offer high quality alternatives at affordable prices, "says the CEO.

Accessibility, awareness and frequency

What are the causes that lead families to move away from balanced diets? To better understand these problems, and in partnership with the University of Zaragoza and other academic partners, Dia has promoted an intervention study in Spain focused on vulnerable groups to know what the food barriers are. This analysis of the socioeconomic barrier has also been carried out in Portugal (together with the CAIS Association), Brazil and Argentina.

These studies, in fact, have made it possible to find a key connection point: once access to food is guaranteed, knowledge is the differential point for a person to follow a healthy diet.

Taking into account the impact of food barriers and knowledge about a person's diet, the Eat Better Every Day program pivots on three axes: Accessibility, to ensure that food is accessible, geographically and economically; Knowledge, to disseminate the relevance of following a balanced diet, and Frequency, to help people consolidate good eating habits.

"We have activated initiatives to extend geographical accessibility, such as the alliance with the social and commercial logistics network of La Exclusiva in Spain, thanks to which even the neighbor of the most isolated village in Soria can have weekly access to fresh products," explains Pilar Hermida, Director of Communication and Sustainability of Grupo Dia.

In Spain, even the neighbor of the most isolated village in Soria can have weekly access to fresh produce thanks to Dia's alliance with La Exclusiva.

To promote the Knowledge axis, for example, the company has developed a dissemination content strategy with the support of the Growth, Exercise, Nutrition and Development (GENUD) research group of the University of Zaragoza. These are recipes, tips and tricks that have been developed after identifying a list of foods of high nutritional density present in the Dia assortment in different presentations (fresh, frozen or preserved) and that allow to compose a healthy, easy and fast menu, and at an affordable price.

In this context, Boticaria García – who is an ambassador of the Eat Better Every Day program – recalls that it is possible to maintain a healthy diet despite having a small budget or living in unpopulated areas with few stores. "Eating healthy is not expensive. What's too cheap is eating unhealthy ultra-processed foods. It is important to focus on foods of high nutritional density with a low cost, such as 'boat' legumes, deep-frozen vegetables or yogurts. They are foods that, although they have a certain degree of processing, maintain the nutritional properties of their 'cousins' raw and that can be preserved for weeks or months at home, "concludes the expert.

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