Professor of IPB: Beans are a Diabetes Super Food
Researchers of the Department of Food Science and Technology, of the Faculty of Agricultural Technology of Bogor Agricultural University (FATETA IPB), Prof. Dr. Fransiska Rungkat Zakaria, made innovation by finding out the best way to prevent diabetes. She explained the best way is to reduce portion sizes of foods we eat, or find ways to make healthy food choices, such as intact crops like beans. Diabetes itself occurs due to the wrong diet such as eating industrial foods that contain preservatives and food perisa.
"Indonesia has made significant progress in health outcomes over the last decades. However, new challenges have emerged as a result of social and economic changes. Hunger and malnutrition remain the most devastating problems facing the majority of the Indonesian, especially for the poor. In contrast, unbalanced food intakes that cause excessive consumption in association with changes in lifestyle that will effect to a range of non-communicable diseases also should be considered as emerging significant public health problem for Indonesia. In addition, global food crisis triggered cultural shift towards junk food in Indonesia. Junk foods are high in calories but low in nutritional value. In general, these foods include processed and prepared snack foods with long, often unpronounceable ingredient lists. Consuming excess sugars and fats found in these foods can contribute to weight gain. This excess weight is associated with diabetes. Non communicable diseases (PTM) are more and more prevalent in Indonesia, it has health burden of non-communicable diseases they double the burden of infective diseases, it has exceeded 60% of the state burden, " said Prof Franciska.
Food processing is the transformation of raw ingredients, by physical or chemical means into food, or of food into other forms. Food processing combines raw food ingredients such as white rice, wheat, sugar, margarine, salt and cooking oil, to produce marketable food products that can be easily prepared and served by the consumer. She also explained that the raw material carries very high calories but is poor in protein, good fats, vitamins, minerals, fiber and bioactive components. And it is no coincidence that rates of heart disease, cancer, diabetes, and obesity are at an all-time high. Industrial food production heightens the risk of the spread of food-borne illnesses. As a result, obesity rates, diabetes, heart disease, cancer, Alzheimer's and other PTM are increasing in Indonesia
Regulation of the Health Minister No. 30/2013 dated April 13, 2013, require the inclusion of sugar, salt, and fat contents as well as the health message on processed foods and fast foods. The 2013 Regulation of the Health Minister on GGL regulation should be implemented in the industry in 2016. Unfortunately the regulation has not been implementated due to the food industry and the economy constraints, and is postponed until 2019. In addition, the application of GGL taxes , will be started soon with the import tax on sugar.
"The other alternative solution to overcome this health threat rather than the implementation of the Ministry of Health is to support the processing of agricultural products into the consumable commodities without intensive processing," she said.
Efforts have been made to respond the health treats in Indonesia, one of which is to breed and increase the agricultural products especially beans. Steaming vegetables consisted of various beans is a healthy way to cook vegetables. It requires no additional fats and the steaming process helps the vegetable itself to retain more nutrients and flavor Beans contain a lot of soluble fiber, protein, carbohydrates, folate and iron. They also contain Lectins, which are also present in high amounts in grains. Because of their protein content, beans (legumes) often get a primary role in the diet of vegetarians, though not without cost.
Beans can be counted either as vegetables or in the meat, poultry, fish, beans, eggs and nuts group. Some legumes, like soy, are even widely considered to be health foods, and marketed as nutritionally superior alternatives to animal products. Some legumes, like lentils or dal, contain fewer problematic compounds and are easier to digest than heartier legumes like kidney and lima beans. Green peas and snap peas also tend to be more successful. However, there are a couple of legumes, such as peanuts and soy that we try to avoid. The study of Prof. Fransiska shows that eating black soybeans – based foods, both fresh and processed products has been scientifically proven to lower stress and blood glucose levels.
Beans are high in fiber and low in fat, a combination shown to prevent a variety of diseases, including heart disease, cancer and obesity. Beans, such as black beans, kidney, garbanzo, are loaded with fiber and important vitamins and minerals while being very low in fat. Foods that contain carbohydrates will affect blood glucose levels if consumed in whole form (a whole), they have tremendous benefit in preventing and providing therapy for diabetes and other PTM, "she said. (Wied)
