The Mediterranean Diet is the Best for Health, protects and develops refined traditional Know-how working along with the sustainability of the planet and it provides ideal opportunities for cultural and diplomatic exchanges.
It is a healthy diet that helps prevent major chronic illnesses such as cardiovascular disease, diabetes, bulimia and obesity.
Thanks to the anti-oxidant power of olive oil combined with the products of the earth (cereals, vegetables, seeds and fruits), fish and little meat (strictly from sustainable farming and breeding), the Mediterranean diet was found to be an important tool even for cancer prevention.
After more than 60 years of studies the extra virgin olive oil seems to be the elixir of long life!
The Mediterranean diet in addition to the universal value to health, teaches a way of life based on relationships, which reinforces the sense of belonging and sharing between peoples and their territories.
The ancient wisdom of the Mediterranean peoples is of great value for the entire planet for it teaches the respect for the territories with their precious biodiversity, and entails the preservation of traditional trades linked to not intensive farming, breeding and fishing.
Particular products of tiny territories are, in this way, protected from extinction, and can thus develop economies of “products of excellence”, with their sublime flavors and balanced nutritional values. Careful not to intoxicate land and its products, new communities can thrive on food industry and tourism of the highest quality and beauty.
Mediterranean Diet: universal value for health … a way of life that gives life to virtuous economies
Essential ingredient, among the many valuable this program is “eating together“, which is much more than “taking a meal”: it is the foundation of interpersonal relationships, promotes dialogue and creativity, hands down the identity and the community values. The “common meal” is the basis of social customs, of festivities, is exchange of knowledge, songs, aphorism, tales and legends.
Mediterranean Diet, it reinforces the notion of sustainable development and the preservation of landscape, avoiding the depopulation of the countryside, allowing at the same time, the consumers to access quality products and to learn their beneficial virtues.
It is the common heritage that unites the eating habits of the people of Italy, Spain, Greece, Morocco, Portugal, Croatia and Cyprus. But it is precisely in Italy that it is reached the most complete testimony of each of the values that UNESCO has given to the Mediterranean Diet.
Camogli – Liguria Region – Fish Fair – Frying Pan stainless steel, it weighs 28 tons, a diameter of 4 Mt.,
a handle 6 Mt. Douring the day of the Fish Fair 30,000 are fried seafood, using 3 tons of fresh fish and
3,000 liters of oil.
Italy, among all the Mediterranean countries, offers unsurpassed experiences with landscapes, festivals, fairs, chefs, inns, large hotels, small restaurants, Relais Chateaux, companies, craftsmen, schools, doctors, hospitals, writers, artists and much, much more: a refined tribe, hardworking, passionate and joyful, that spins around this Heritage of mankind!
The countries of the Mediterranean, share, since ancient times, the availability of foods derived from farming, herding and fishing.
Traditional knowledge of Mediterranean Diet strengthen the idea of sustainable development and the preservation of the landscape, avoiding the depopulation of the countryside.
In the ’60s many scholars agreed that the life expectancy in this strip of land was among the highest in the world. Ischemia, cancers and chronic diseases were almost non-existent. Notwithstanding the low socio-economic level and the poor health care, here men and women lived longer, thanks to the active lifestyle and to a diet rich in vegetables and low in meat.
From this observation it was born the epidemiological study that affirms, to the present day, that the Mediterranean Diet is, with no doubt, the best prevention of cardiovascular disease and is the most suitable for human well-being.
Ancel Keys, American biologist and physiologist at the University of Minnesota, during World War II was the creator of the K ration, the daily ration supplied to US forces during the war. During a stay in Naples, an Italian colleague, the physiologist Bergami of Naples University, pointed out to him that the workers of that area rarely suffered from heart attacks. Hence Keys began a study enlisting a total of approximately 12,000 of volunteers from different countries of the world: Spain, South Africa, U:S:A:, Japan, Finland, the Netherlands, Yugoslavia, Greece. After more than twenty years of investigations, the research concluded that populations that feed primarily with foods high in monounsaturated fat had a low incidence of cardiovascular disease.
The key factor turned out to be the widespread use of olive oil …
The pilot study of this multi-center research, called the Seven Country Study (since initially involved seven countries) was conducted in 1957 in Nicotera, a small town in Calabria, now recognized world center of the Mediterranean Diet.
In 1990 the World Health Organization officially confirmed the results of the Seven Country Study!
Ancel Keys lived until 2003 in Italy. He died in Minneapolis in 2004, more than 100 years old.
Today, the Mediterranean Diet is indicated as the most correct diet for human health, with low content of saturated fat and high content of nutrient derived from grains, fruits and vegetables and little meat (indicated only 4 times per month).
In 2010 UNESCO included the Mediterranean Diet as intangible heritage of humanity since “it involves a set of skills, knowledge, rituals, symbols and traditions concerning the crops, fisheries, animal husbandry, storage, processing, cooking, and particularly the sharing and eating the food. ”
It is a model of a sustainable diet that offers great opportunities to all nations that adopt it.
Today, thanks to the “web culture” consumers around the world can access, more and more easily, to high-quality products, enjoying their beneficial virtues.
The specialties of the Mediterranean Diet are among the excellence of Made in Italy
to visit, to taste and to export worldwide.