Keeping track on how well your diet meshes with the revised Health Canada’s Eating Well with Canada’s Food Guide is made easier with the Dietitian’s of Canada’s EATracker.ca. 

Dietitians of Canada has collaborated with Health Canada in updating DC’s interactive online tool EATracker™ to make it consistent with the revised recommendations and to assist Canadians to track their daily food and activity choices and help them set goals for better health.

Other great web sites such as Eat Right Ontario and Healthy Eating Is In Store are available, and supported by DC, to help consumers make smart choices about the food they eat to and tools to stay healthy.

More information Canada’s revised Food Guide

The revised food guide, released this week, has some significant changes from its 1992 predecessor.  Some of the changes include:

-         Clear guidance on portion sizes and the number of recommended servings. The new guide clearly illustrates different amounts of daily servings depending on your age or gender. This change makes it easier to determine the right amounts of food to meet needs for healthy growth and development, and reduce your risk of obesity and chronic diseases such as type 2 diabetes, heart disease, certain types of cancer and osteoporosis. The addition of younger children (beginning with 2 years of age) also addresses a previous gap in nutrition guidance.

-         New positioning of vegetables and fruits on the outer-most arc of the rainbow design highlighting the importance of this food group in health promotion and disease prevention. Guidance is also provided on selecting the best choices within each food group – for example, “enjoy foods prepared with little or no added fat, sugar salt; choose vegetables and fruit more often than juice; make at least half of your grain products whole grain everyday; have meat alternatives such as beans, lentils and tofu often; drink lower fat milk, or fortified soy beverages if you do not drink milk, each day.”

-         Guidance on the kinds and amounts of oils & fats that will reduce intake of saturated and trans fats. At least two Food Guide Servings per week of fish such as char, salmon, mackerel and sardines are also recommended for variety and their benefit of omega-3 fats which promote heart health.

Many of the changes were brought about through consultation with Canada’s registered dietitians, which resulted in the new food guide providing a greater focus on lower cost food examples.  “Over one third of dietitians that provided input to DC’s collective voice on the Food Guide work with populations who have difficulty accessing enough healthy foods,” says Lynda Corby, Director of Public Affairs with Dietitians of Canada and leader of the DC food guide consultation. Also, “more examples of ethnic foods also make the Food Guide more appropriate for our culturally diverse nation,” continues Corby.

A more central focus on physical activity given the strong relationship between eating well and being active on feeling good, promoting healthy weights and building strong bones.