A recent survey of fruit and vegetable growers found a third of them are considering leaving the industry, as falling consumption and low prices combine to make farming unviable. Statistics show more than 90% of the population is not eating enough vegetables, prompting a plea for consumers to eat healthier for their own sake and to help farmers.
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00:00Dietitian and nutritionist Gemma O'Hanlon is worried about the nation's health.
00:07Many of us are choosing too many unhealthy foods in our daily diets and it's really not
00:14the individual's fault because we're exposed to these unhealthy foods wherever we go.
00:19The pandemic, followed by a cost of living crisis, has seen more Australians turning
00:24to processed foods and away from fresh fruit and vegetables.
00:28Overweight and obesity, heart disease, type 2 diabetes and many cancers are also linked
00:33with poor diet so this is a real serious problem.
00:37The number of Australian adults eating the recommended daily intake of fresh fruit dropped
00:42by more than 7% during the pandemic, down to 44.1%.
00:47But when it comes to eating our greens, a 1% drop means just 6.5% of the population
00:53are eating enough vegetables.
00:55Finding time to prepare them as our lives get busier is one issue, as is the perception
01:00that eating healthy is too expensive.
01:03The good news is that veggies are not expensive.
01:07In fact, fresh veggies on average are about 65 cents a serve.
01:11Catherine Valesha's family has been growing vegetables on Melbourne's western fringe for
01:15three generations, but with production costs climbing at a much faster rate than prices,
01:20the future looks grim.
01:22We're all looking at our businesses saying, we're growing produce that people don't really
01:26want and with costs of inputs going up, where do we sit in this market?
01:31The peak industry body, AusVeg, has found that over a third of producers are considering
01:36leaving the industry in the next 12 months.
01:39They want people to eat healthier, making it a win-win for farmers and the consumer.
01:44All we need is people to eat one more serve and that could change our health and our industry.
01:49Eating your greens to look after the nation's health.
01:52For more UN videos visit www.un.org