NAT160 - Personal Dietary Improvement Plan: Healthy Eating Guidelines

This assignment focuses on evaluating and improving personal eating habits based on Canada's Healthy Eating Guidelines. It includes a self-assessment of dietary weaknesses, identification of beneficial food substitutions like apples and avocados, and strategies for incorporating these changes into the diet. The student discusses replacing less preferred vegetables like spinach with nutrient-rich fruits. Implementation strategies cover aspects such as diversifying food choices, maintaining consistent eating times, and ensuring food quality. The assignment also reflects on the practical challenges and costs associated with adopting these healthier eating habits. This document is available on Desklib, a platform offering a range of study tools and solved assignments for students.

Running Head: Canadian Healthy Eating Guidelines
The Healthy Eating Guidelines
Name of Student
Name of Institution
Name of Tutor
Date

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Healthy Eating Guidelines
1. Weakness in my diet
Exclusion or not enough fruits in my diet
2. Two foods that when I eat will strengthen the weakness
- Apples
- Avocado
It is important to take fruits frequently in every meal. Fruits carry a lot of vitamins and can
substitute the vitamins that may have been missed in vegetables. Apples and avocado fruits
are known to be rich in vitamins and would provide healthy eating when included in the
meals (Hackett, 2012). Although the two types of fruit are more expensive compared to other
types of fruits, they are one of the richest in vitamins one would wish to have a taste.
3. Two foods that I may replace or the ones that I can live without
The foods that I can easily replace are the vegetables, more specifically spinach.
This is because this food provides vitamins but I have enough foods to provide
vitamin in my diet. However, it may have adequate vitamins than any other type
of vegetable as many studies have indicated (Dorn-, Savenkova, Sidorova &
Golub, 2015). It is, therefore, important to replace it with another food that is of
greater importance like fruits. It is known that different foods have varied vitamin
content and that is the reason I choose Avocado and Apple fruits.
4. One food that would be easy to remove from my diet is spinach vegetable and
the one that would be easy to add in mango fruit.
5. Planning how to incorporate this change in my diet
a) At Lunchtime
b) One fruit of 15grammes

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Healthy Eating Guidelines
c) I will make sure this food is available at this time by ensuring that I have enough
of it in store to avoid last minute rush searching for the food when it is already
meal time.
d) I would eat the vegetables I replaced at lunchtime and supper i.e. at 12 noon and at
8 pm
e) I would likely replace 30 grams of this food and leave the rest of about 10 grams.
Part c: Personal strategies
Strategy 1: Eat different foods
I have experienced a boring eating habit resulting from a poor diet. Before I decide on the
vegetables and fruits to buy, I will first ensure that I check the types of vegetables and fruits
that are available in the shops or markets. In this case, I would shop at different shops or
markets so that I can find what I exactly need.
Strategy 2: Observe eating times
I will ensure that I observe the intervals of eating my meals. This will help me get my food
when the body really needs it.
Strategy 3: Eating the right quantity
It is important to eat the right quantity of food i.e. not too much neither too little food is
required. The right quantity of food enables the body to get the right quantity of nutrients.
Strategy 4: Eating quality food
This is an important aspect in ensuring that one a healthy diet is realized. Food must,
therefore, be cooked properly (Winson, 2010).
Strategy 5: Using spices while preparing my food to make it more tasty and at the same time
using proper ingredients on the food.

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Healthy Eating Guidelines
Part D: Implementation of the first strategy
a) In implementing this strategy, my appetite has improved a lot because I am able to eat
different vegetables and different fruits as opposed to the previous time when I could
eat only one type of these foods.
Substitutions that I included in my diet include fruits like mango and apples but I also
ensured inclusion of beverages like mango juices to spice my meals. These substitutions are
helpful in improving my appetite (Kakoschke, Kemps & Tiggemann, 2014).
b) I had problems finding certain types of food and it forced me to sometimes travel long
distances to various markets where I could find what I need.
c) Total cost of foods
Vegetables 15 USD per 50 kg bag
Fruits 30 USD per 20 kg bag
These costs indicate that the total expenditure for vegetables is twice that of fruits.
However, these costs keep changing with time and it is important to buy in bulk,
perhaps which can serve for a week or so.

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Healthy Eating Guidelines
References
Dorn-, G., Savenkova, T., Sidorova, O., & Golub, O. (2015). Confectionery goods for
a healthy diet. Foods and Raw Materials, 3(1), 70-76. doi: 10.12737/11240
Hackett, R. (2012). The IGD Best Practice Guide to communicating with consumers
about a healthy, balanced diet. Nutrition Bulletin, 37(1), 67-71. doi: 10.1111/j.1467-
3010.2011.01944.x
Kakoschke, N., Kemps, E., & Tiggemann, M. (2014). Attention bias modification
encourages healthy eating. Eating Behaviour’s, 15(1), 120-124. doi:
10.1016/j.eatbeh.2013.11.001
Winson, A. (2010). The Demand for Healthy Eating: Supporting a Transformative
Food “Movement”. Rural Sociology, 75(4), 584-600. doi: 10.1111/j.1549-
0831.2010.00033.x