I came across a very interesting post the other day at Ayala's Herbal Water in which she suggests some useful tips on how to get children to eat fruit and vegetables. I think she has a point when she says that children copy adults, so it is as clear as daylight that children won't eat F&V if the parents are meat lovers, like most parents in my country, or if they give in to their children's wishes to have pizza or a MacDonald's meal every other day.
In Cyprus, a very serious effort has been made recently to include fresh fruit and vegetables as alternative snacks to chocolate, ice cream, crisps, cheese pies or doughnuts during school recesses. Unfortunately, children ignore the fruit and veggies and would rather give their pocket money for a packet of crisps instead of a banana or cola instead of fruit juice! On the other hand, I was very happy to hear that most playschools provide the parents with a list of snacks for their children to bring to school, such as apples, bananas, oranges and brown bread sandwiches with tomato, cucumber and low-fat cheese and ham. You may smile but I think that a child needs to get used to healthy eating habits at a young age.
Despite these efforts, there are still a lot of obese children in Cyprus aged 8-12. To me, an obese child will almost invariably grow into an obese adult although once in their teens, things seem to change. Many teenagers - especially girls- go on extreme diets in an effort to look like Beyonce and, as a result, they become victims of various eating disorders.
Depriving children of their favourite foods is also wrong. Once a week , they can have their favourite junk food , their favourite sweet, their favourite ice cream. But getting used to eating F&V at a very young age - as young as the age of three - children will grow into happy, healthy adults who will never have to go on diet simply because they eat a little bit of everything.

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