Fruits are sweet and important to our health but it's consumption is relatively low among students. I remembered when I was younger, what we were exposed to then were lollipop, candy, biscuits and tasty times which all contained sugar. I grew up spending my money on buying these things without knowing they are not that good for our health.
Many adults battle with diabetes in Nigeria because of increase in sugar intake. But we fail to address the issue overtime from the scratch.
Early this year, I went to class and I bought a bunch of banana and a bottle of coke to class because I wanted to teach "Consumer goods" and I planned using that as my examples. After the class I raised the Coke up and asked if anyone of them wants and 95 percent raised their hands. I did the same for the bananas just a few raised their hands. I had to enlightened them on the effects of both on their health. I can't blame them much, they copied what they saw in their environment.
Most times, when mothers give their children money they will tell them to go and use the money to buy 'sweet' why sweet and not tiger nut? Why not tangerines and oranges? This is where most of these adults that have diabetes started from. Because they were exposed to sugary things they tend to increase the consumption of these things as they grow and when they discovered that they have diabetes it becomes difficult to leave these sugary things.
Anytime I'm going go school in the morning I see the way students queue to buy "cold Tasty time' even when it is raining. They were not taught to consume more fruits and other healthy things. I know at that age they can burn out the sugar intake but that exposure and addiction is difficult to stop overtime. That's why some adults can't do without "Coke and fanta".
I remembered when I had the opportunity to serve in my fellowship as the financial secretary, they tagged my fellowship "the zobo fellowship" what happened?
A deficit account was handed over to me and when I went through a the expenses, a larger part was on parties which I know was needed. I can't stop these events but I asked God for wisdom and part of my initiative was to substitute Zobo in place of 'Coke and fanta ' so, althrough my tenure there was no spendings on "Soft drinks". I was able to manage the fellowship account and handed over the surplus fund to the next tenure. We all know that Zobo is good for the health and it is pocket friendly.
> You can say these things are cheaper compared to fruits. This is absolutely not true, we have fruits that are not too expensive. Even the "Tasty time" is now #150 while we still have #100 oranges. I know diabetes can be hereditary but it will actually reduce if we encourage our children to eat more fruits.
Let's add fruits to our diet daily and stop thinking it's meant for some set of people. It is affordable and in different grades. I know you might probably be saying "people are hungry, you are talking of fruits" I truly understand the situation of the country, it is just for us to plan our meals . From your monthly or daily budget on food, a small part of it can be used to get fruits.
An average Nigerian home consume more of starchy foods and the end result of it is still sugar by add fruits to our children's diet will boost their immunity and reduce child's sicknesses and diseases.
As a mother, eat fruits so that your children too can learn from you likewise fathers. I know that if we do these, children will be more healthier and diabetes in general will reduce. Did I say we should not give them all these lollipops? No, let's reduce the way we expose the young ones to it and substitute a part of these things with fruits or other healthy drinks.
Kindly drop your view on this in the comment section.
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