Spring 1995
Grains Make Gains in Winning Americans Over
By Aase Hamnes , Wheat Foods Council
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Prairie Grains is the
official publication of
the Minnesota
Association of
Wheat Growers,
North Dakota Grain
Growers Association,
South Dakota Wheat,
Inc., and the
Minnesota Barley
Growers Association.
The survey found that Americans average three servings of bread and grain foods a day. This is a far cry from the recommended 6 to 11, but it does mark a slight improvement (equivalent to an additional slice of bread per week) over the 2.8 daily servings Americans averaged in a 1993 Gallup survey.
More promising for the grain industry is that familiarity with the Food Guide Pyramid (with grain servings at its base) doubled in the last two years, from 27 percent in 1993 to 56 percent in this survey.
Further, there appears to be a link between awareness and action, as Gallup found that 81 percent of those who do eat at least six servings of grain foods daily are familiar with the Food Guide Pyramid.
Also encouraging, the number of Americans who believe the myth "bread is fattening" decreased from 49 percent in 1993 to 40 percent in 1995.
Increasing consumer awareness of the health benefits of grain foods is a primary function of the Wheat Foods Council (WFC), supported in part through the wheat checkoff administered by the Minnesota Wheat Research and Promotion Council.
The WFC will continue to help Americans understand how grain-based eating is a painless and simple way to help achieve the low fat, high carbohydrate diet needed for optimum health.
We need to continue to encourage Americans to eat even more bread and grain foods. Most Americans are only three slices of bread away from getting at least the lower end of the 6 to 11 recommended daily servings.
Per capita flour consumption could increase as much as 37 pounds if Americans met the Food Guide Pyramid's grain foods guidelines, says Judy Adams, the registered dietitian who heads the nonprofit WFC.
That's the equivalent of 300 million bushels of wheat -- enough to cover a five-mile strip running from San Francisco to New York, and equal to our three largest export markets in 1993-94. Put in terms of dollars, it's $1 billion in incremental sales.