Dietitians' meeting in Buenos Aires

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Last week the Argentinean Association of Dietitians and Nutritionists Dietitians (AADYND) held the 1st AADYND Congress of Food and Nutrition in Buenos Aires. Many colleagues from the country and from Latin America were presents and I had the pleasure to be invited as a speaker. Because of my experience in the US and in the international dietetics field, my topic was “Dietary Guidelines around the world, the Dietary Guidelines for Americans (DGA) 2015-2020”. The DGA have been always of a great interest at international level, especially because of its repercussion on food industry.  The session was very interesting; a colleague presented how the latest 2015 Argentinean Dietary Guidelines (ADG) are being implemented. The ADG have a nice round icon similar to a plate were consumption of vegetables and fruits, drinking water, less salt and more physical activity are emphasized as many of the dietary guidelines in other countries (see pictures).  There are 83 dietary guidelines around the world, but only represents 38% of the countries (and only 6% of low income countries have dietary guidelines). Only 4 dietary guidelines mention sustainability and environmental issues: Brasil, Qatar, Sweden and Germany. We concluded that food and nutrition experts are key players to communicate Dietary Guidelines and to empower people to make small dietary changes to improve their nutrition and health.

Other topics that, in my opinion, attracted much attention in the meeting were how we use new technologies and how we as a professionals position ourselves in social media, experiences in the sport nutrition field with colleagues that participated in Rio Olimpic Games and dietitians role in research (we have potential to do much more in this field!!)

Romina with AADYND Board of Directors members