What is Samoa like

In my year as a youngster, I spent three whole winters in Satapuala for the American Youth Leadership Program with Samoa. It was the aim of the visit to examine the contributing causes of fatness and dietary uncertainty in Samoa and to consider the resemblances and disparities with the dietary concerns of our own state.

Before my visit to Samoa, I used similar figures to suggest that, as in the USA, the presence of cheaper junk foods such as McDonald's must be a major factor in this high adiposity. Indeed, during my five or six travels to the small metropolis, Samoa's only municipal, commercialised area, I've only seen this one McDonald's.

Fifty years ago, according to a physician we saw in Apia, hardly anyone in Samoa was overweight. Whereas Samoa was only recently confronted with adiposity problems, my Samoa experiences have shown that the plethora of globalised quick foods was not the cause of this dramatic turn. Although not completely unapproachable, the purchase of products that have been bought from abroad will require a considerable journey away from the country towns to a more populous area with a grocer'.

In the three wks I spent with my homestay in Satapuala town, I only recall the carrot, choi brook (maybe once or twice) and the incidental cider. On the whole, the cheapest and therefore most widely consumed food stuffs are local starches: Ulu (or baked breadberry - a starched nut that grows on lush, large-leaved plants that remind me of potatos and plantains), Tàllo (taro - a large Samoa export), Niiu (coconut) and Fa'i (bananas), together with exotic crops like flaa (pineapple) and papay.

Bad soils contribute to the shortage of diet. We only have about 8 inch in Samoa," a member of the Samoa Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries told us. With Samoa's land in short supply and rock, Samoa's farmers are growing locally grown harvests on families instead of mass-producing a wide range of products on the mechanised, factory-farmed land we have in the United States.

The shortage of arable crops results in lower use of costly products such as foliage and vegetable and higher demands for less costly, import food processing. The recent rise in the use of manufactured, import food is perhaps the biggest contributor to the Samoa prevalence of adiposity - and another part of Samoan living that I did not expect.

After seeing only the most beautiful images of a tropic heaven before my trip to Samoa, I was expecting to be eating only the freshest fruit and local catch of the year. Actually, I have eaten most often cornd served brown steak, chicken, white loaf, cracker and "spaghetti-o's". Whereas the Samoan countryside's lack of natural separation and cultural heterogeneity make it necessary to buy food imports, most imports of virgin products are too costly to buy on a regular basis.

This leads to a high level of depletion of processed tinned and packed products such as spam, crisps andoda. "Low-grade, energy-intensive products are the lowest in the world," says Jonathan Shaw, associated directory of the Baker IDI Heart and Diabetes Institute of Australia. These tinned or packed goods are non-perishable and less costly than expensively importing fruit and vegetable, so that the Samoan family we have met has mainly purchased them as staple goods.

The WHO's programme manager for the prevention of noncommunicable diseases, Temo Waqanivalu, says that in many Pacific Islanders, prices for manufactured food imports are lower than for local food, as "fishermen often sell the kind of catches they make to buy their own stuff. "5 "5 I was eating only once with my homestay (since the sea was only five minutes away on foot) - and it was in cans.

Aliioaiga Feturi Elisaia, Samoa's US and United Nations envoy, says that few were overweight in Samoa before the advent of cheaper food from abroad. Because of this need for low-cost import, Samoa's eating of energy-rich food has led to an alarming level of adiposity.

In spite of this recent move towards importing healthy products, it is still a major cultural part of Samoan people. The evenings prayers every evenings (99.1% of Samoan Christians) were usually served with goodies such as sweet coffee and home-made cakes. Four Samoans still often boil with their old-fashioned way of boiling with an ufu - a fireplace cooked with warm coal, with sheets of bananas piled over the meal to be used.

Every sunday we have been helping to cook this tradition food for the to' onai - a big dinner for villagers and community leader that takes place every Sunday after school. It is interesting that Samoan cattle are relatively well and most households breed their own hens and swine. Samoan free-range hens supply both thin meats and soybeans.

It' s a shock to see how the Samoan diet and the nation's economy have changed with the rise of world commerce - familyckiosks that sell the sweets, crisps, biscuits and sodas that my guest brothers and sisters visit almost every day have been omnipresent in every town I have been to. "7 "7 A characteristic Samoan supper made by my Samoan guest mom used to combine both local and Western dishes: for example poultry chowder with frame, fried bread fruit and tartar and a chap sweet with corndndbeef.

Nearly everywhere I went, I found a similar mixture of old-fashioned food, in combination with or with packed import food and locally produced starch, with few veg... It is a widespread tendency in the remote, recently industrialised Pacific Island area. The World Health Organization's survey in eight different Pacific island states found that less than 20% of respondents said they ate the five or more servings of fruits and veg per diem they recommend.

The fight against obesity in Samoa would therefore primarily call for better accessibility to fruit and veg. Despite the fact that adiposity is still an urgent problem, Samoa has made several attempts to reduce the rate of adiposity and to increase arabiability. During our trip to the Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries of Samoa, we were briefed by Samoa Department of Agriculture and Fisheries on various programmes to tackle the challenge of low-grade plant varieties, which include promoting exports and research into GM plants and locally grown techniques.

Pacific Food Summit 2010 representatives reached an agreement to tighten the rules on the nutritional labelling of food products imported, which often differ in terms of languages and contents. In addition, the Ministry of Public Health in Samoa has launched exercise programmes in 173 of its elementary and middle school facilities. The continuation and strengthening of these agricultural, regulatory and educational activities is essential to further reduce Samoa's rates of adiposity.

While in Samoa I quickly learnt that a sole fat count - 41. Top ical themes such as import prices, a shortage of top quality land, bad plant varieties and a diet that is now predominated by manufactured import foodstuffs are contributing to this malnutrition. I have learnt from my observation in Samoa that only by learning about and looking at all aspects of human and animal welfare at first hand can we prevent limiting the number of individuals to simple statistical data and facing up to these kinds of challenge.

2) Samoa. the World Health Organization. 3 ) Adult adiposity. Samoa. Samoan are waiting for the delicious turkey tail to return. Spamming at the core of the South Asia case. People of the Archipelago are paying a high cost for the abandonment of conventional food. World Health Organization. 9) Health Education and Promotion Section. Ministry of Health.