Transforming Nutritional Value into Commercial Gain: The Impact of Intensive Food Production

Abstract

Two thousand years have passed since Hippocrates (Hippocrates of Kos, 460 BC) coined the famous phrase: "let food be your medicine", with which he wanted to indicate the high biological value of food and its therapeutic content. But in the time of Hippocrates, man and food went hand in hand to provide all the resources and nutrients essential for survival. Two thousand years later, the industrial revolution completely overturned that profound bond. Food has lost its natural biological and therapeutic value, and has been replaced by symbolic contents, surrogates of the original meaning, but essential for a society based on consumption. Furthermore, the symbiotic bond between man and mother nature, which represents the essence of life itself, has been broken, making us lose track of our origins. The need to implement production to satisfy the growing global demand for food has led to the use of chemical substances that are effective in combating biological pests that destroy foodstuffs. These substances remain throughout the production chain even after transformation into ready-to-eat foods. So, if on the one hand chemistry has solved production problems, on the other it has generated serious consequences for the health of consumers. The objective of this work is promoting consumer food awareness for responsible and sustainable consumption of food.