Comenius Project “The Consumer Society and Youth in Europe” Questionnaire on food habits and consumer society Results of the Italian school I.T.C. A. ZANON – UDINE – Italy by Zucchetto Riccardo

What do we usually eat?

In November 2009 students attending ITC A. Zanon in Udine (ITALY) were asked to fill in a questionnaire about our food habits…let’s start from our ages; since many classes were asked to answer to it, our ages are different…

We were also asked to indicate what are the basic needs of human beings.

Have students already learnt or talked about this topic, “The consumer society and food habits”? 56% have already done this. This is very important in order to create a more careful society about consumerism and food.

But when and where did consumerism started? Most of us agree that it started between the Industrial Revolution and the 20th century, in the industrialized countries with market economy.

However, it’s difficult to define consumerism…

The majority of the students interviewed think that consumerism is influenced the most by publicity, but it isn’t a possible solution to economic crisis, and it also has heavy environmental effects.

OUR FOOD HABITS

Which nutrients are the most important ones for health?

And what about a balanced diet? What do we think to have a balanced one?

What kind of food do we like?

Organic food: 51% of students control if the food is organic or sustainably produced, sometimes. 64% think that organic food means a healtier food, which also respects the environment.

The majority of Italian students think that the most important meal is…

Now let’s have a look at our breakfast, lunch and supper; most of us usually have milk or coffee with biscuits or cereals for breakfast..

..concerning lunch, our preferred food is… PASTA!!! But we also eat rice, meat, vegetables…

Referring to the results, many of us have one or two large meals, and some light snacks per day, usually one or two…

..and our supper? It is very diversified…

We usually have supper between 7 p.m. and 9 p.m. We also know dishes coming from other European countries, mostly from Spain and Germany:

Let’s consider fast foods.. are their dishes tasty?

Are they healthy?

..we prefer home-made meals and our delicious pasta; they are more healthy!!

Does the food we eat influence our school performances? 65% of us think so.

We are approaching the end of the questionnaire… how do we receive our information about food? The most selected answers are: 1) from school; 2) from parents; 3) from media.

And finally…is publicity reliable or misleading?