My earliest memories are of life in Karlgarin - a small wheatbelt town not far from Wave Rock. My father was the sole teacher in the small school, posted there a couple of years after the end of WWII. Without electricity my mother cooked on a wood stove, and kept food in a Coolgardie safe or the kerosene refrigerator. The latter occasionally misbehaved and belched large quantities of black smoke into the kitchen.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
or signup to continue reading
The community was very poor and food was in short supply. We had a large rainwater tank sitting on the ground and every afternoon I did my best to pump water by hand into a smaller overhead tank, but my father always completed the task. The tank stand served another purpose - it was used to hang kangaroo meat.
Every few weeks a farmer would shoot a kangaroo and donate it to the teacher. We would eat kangaroo for a week or so and then perhaps rabbit or mutton. Vegetables were purchased from the single store in town or again donated by the farmers. We occasionally had fresh milk, although I remember most was 'lumpy' sunshine.
In those days all the children were skinny, on the border of undernutrition and rates of childhood illnesses were high. Today children are heavier and more likely to be overweight or obese. We have improved health of children dramatically but are now experiencing an increased rate of obesity-related illnesses.
After graduating in medicine, I worked in Papua New Guinea and saw the effect of undernutrition on childhood illnesses. Children with malnutrition died of diseases such as flu, whooping cough and measles, where in Australia most would have survived. I was fortunate in obtaining a scholarship to study at Harvard and began a life of nutrition research and advocacy.
MORE OPINION
We now know undernutrition predisposes to infections and eating the wrong foods and/or becoming obese results in chronic diseases including cancer and heart disease. The main themes of public health nutrition have not changed much over the decades and include promoting breastfeeding; eating more fruit, vegetables and whole grain foods; limiting fat, sugar and salt; doing more exercise; and for adults maintaining a stable, healthy weight. For infants and children appropriate growth is important. Nutrition is of course more complex than this and more details for all ages are available at eatforhealth.gov.au.
Climate change is already affecting food production and will provide more challenges in the future. Eating a healthier diet is also compatible with lower greenhouse gas emissions. I am sure learning about the origins of food in my early years played a part in the direction of my life's work.
