By Terry Leahy, 2015.

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In some ways the Chikukwa Project has been a victim of its own success. Two decades of food security, adult education and community building, have actually set up the community to engage more successfully in the market economy. The by-now adult children of people who were originally trained in permaculture and food security are going elsewhere for work and further education or growing marketable crops in nearby locations. With this cash income have come some of the diseases of affluence, especially diabetes and heart trouble. Some people have had a little money to buy food and have not been eating well. Sam Chimbarara, one of the management team, asked me if I could write something about guidelines to avoid these problems through diet. As someone who has had heart trouble and been trained in the evidence based science of healthy eating, I was up for the task and produced this leaflet. As you will see, my recommendations are those of the philanthropist rather than the sociologist. It is what you might ideally do to avoid these conditions, making use of the best science, rather than what is a likely strategy given cultural norms. Julious Piti made the comment that if a husband suggested this diet to his wife, she would think he was just being stingy with the family income – no sugar, no sweet treats, no poloni.

 

This is a pretty strict set of guidelines. If you start keeping to this when you are about three years old and keep it up for the rest of your life you will be very unlikely to develop diabetes or heart trouble. The annoying part about this is that some people will eat a bad diet their whole lives and end up quite healthy, while the rest of us are going to end up getting diabetes or heart trouble.

In terms of what these rules say are good things to eat, they are:

1. Roughage and fibre, which helps us to digest things.
2. Vitamins, which keep us from getting sick.
3. Protein, which is good for building our bodies and making us strong.

The list of things to limit and the list of things to avoid are designed for three main purposes that are very relevant to diabetes and heart trouble:

1. To avoid animal fats (like the white part of meat, or any kind cheese, or poloni, which has animal fats minced into it). These animal fats clog up our arteries and lead to heart trouble.

2. To avoid sugar completely and reduce the amount of white (refined carbohydrate). These are the things that give us diabetes.

3. To get most salt out of the diet. An excess of salt that can give us high blood pressure and lead to heart problems.

All of these things (animal fats, sugar, salt) are the kinds of things that were really rare in the diets of our ancestors. The wild animals our ancestors used to hunt did not have much fat on their bodies. There was no sugar available in those days and salt was very scarce. Our bodies are not adapted to be fed great quantities of these things.

 

Good things to eat:

• Avocadoes (help our bodies to make use of the vitamins in fruit and vegetables).

• Vegetable oil for cooking (helps our bodies to make use of the vitamins in fruit and vegetables).

• Beans, round nuts and cow peas – three or four meals a week (protein).

• Nuts and peanut butter (protein).

• Meat – chicken, beef or goat – once or twice a week – but cut off the fat (the white part) before cooking it (proteins).

• Fish – once or twice a week (protein and no animal fats).

• Eggs – one a day if possible (protein).

• Up to two litres of water a day (helps us to digest food and to have energy).

• Vegetables – eat lots – kovo (local cabbage), tsunga (canola), black jack, umbowa (amaranth) and so on – with every meal (vitamins and fibre).

• Fruit – eat two pieces of fruit a day, especially fruit with vitamin C = oranges, naatches, guavas, pineapples, mangoes, loquats, granadillas (vitamins, energy and fibre).

• Rapoko porridge, whole wheat porridge or home cooked brown bread (vitamins and energy).

• Onions and garlic (good for your health).

• Chillis and peppers (good for your health).

• Sweet potato and madumbe – taro (fibre and energy).

 

What to limit:

Don’t eat more than a quarter of a plate of all of these combined at any one meal.

These are called “refined carbohydrates”. This means that all the fibre and vitamins have been taken out of them in the way they are processed. Eating too much of them makes us fat and also makes us feel tired. It is one of the causes of diabetes because the sudden energy they produce makes our energy system go haywire.

• Sadza (white maize porridge).

• White bread.

• Irish potatoes.

 

What to avoid:

Too much of these are what is causing diabetes and heart trouble here. It is the change in the diet, which has come with the addition of these things, which is causing the new spike in diabetes, heart trouble and weight problems.

• Sugar – try to keep this to only one teaspoon in one cup of tea of coffee in the whole day. This is the most important message for diabetes here.

• No juices, cordials or soft drinks – like Fanta or Coke. These are full of sugar.

• No jam – also full of sugar.

• Honey – make it a rare treat. Just the same as sugar.

• No cakes. These have lots of sugar in them.

• Poloni or sausages – do not eat any of these – they are full of animal fats.

• No margarine – these usually have trans fats, which are bad for your heart.

• Salt – limit to a teaspoon (for the whole family) when you are cooking dinner. Do not sprinkle this on your food. Salt gives you blood pressure, which leads to heart problems.

• Dairy – whole fat dairy – don’t eat any butter, cream or cheese. Limit dairy to milk in your hot drinks. Cheese, butter and cream are full of animal fats. It is good for children to drink milk but not necessary for adults to do so.

• Alcohol – have less than two drinks a day or avoid alcohol completely. It is just like sugar in that it gives you diabetes and makes you fat.