Now you know what you eat

Kudos to Al Safir for an excellent food and nutrition page today, researched by Zaynab Ghosn and Milia AbuJawdeh. The articles include:

"Fatty poisons enter our food camouflaged in the absence of legislations" on the prevalence of trans-fatty acids in the junk the Lebanese love to eat.

"Levels of trans-fatty acids in Lebanon higher than what is internationally considered acceptable" a brief summary of AUB student Carole Saadeh entitled "Fatty acid composition, including trans fatty acids, of some local and regional bakery and snack products in the Lebanese market"

and

"Food industries raise sugar content of their products regardless of health impact"

In arabic

If interested, look up my previous post on food quality and safety of imported products and products locally sold

Food in distress

الصناعات الغذائية اللبنانية... شهرة إلى زوال
الصناعات الغذائية هي أولى الصناعات اللبنانية لجهة حجم صادراتها إلى الخارج، الذي وصل عام 2005 إلى 200 مليون دولار. كان متوقعاً لهذا الرقم أن يرتفع عام 2006 إلى أكثر من 240 مليون دولار، إلاأن حرب تموز بدّدت تلك الآمال، وجاءت الأوضاع السياسية والأمنية الراهنة لتزيد الطين بلة

Lebanese food industry in decline

Food industries provide the bulk of Lebanon's exports, with a value of 200 million $ in 2005 (compare with 2 billion dollars in food imports). The export figure was expected to increase in 2006 to more than $240 million, but this did not materialize due to the July war and to the current political crisis.

Good dossier on Lebanese Food industries (in Arabic)