Christian Wenande
January 19th, 2017

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An increasingly rare sight in Danish kitchens (photo: Pixabay)

According to a new Nordic report from the National Food Institute, Danish kids are eating a little healthier these days.

According to the report, ‘The Nordic Monitoring System 2011-2014’, children are consuming more fruit, vegetables and fish across the entire Nordic region. However, the report also found that social inequality is having a dramatic effect on their diets.

The percentage of poorly-educated parents has more than doubled from 12 to 25 percent. Meanwhile, the percentage of children of well-educated parents who eat unhealthily has fallen from 14 to 11 percent.

“In order to reduce social inequality, it is important to improve the dietary habits of the children of poorly-educated parents, given that the diet among this group is developing in the wrong direction. It is also a goal of the Nordic Plan of Action to reduce social inequality,” said Sisse Fagt, a senior adviser from the National Food Institute.

“The data suggests it will be difficult for the Nordic region as a whole to fulfil the Nordic vision relating to children’s and adults’ diet – with the exception of the target of eating less added sugar.”

READ MORE: Many Danes unnecessarily taking dietary supplements

Forget about fish
The report also revealed that while Danish adults are consuming too little healthy food, they do get plenty of sugar and saturated fats.

The report found that compared to the other Nordic nations, the Danes were particularly averse to eating fish, and that goes for children and adults. In 2011, 24.6 percent of Danes ate fish twice a week, but that figure dropped to 21.7 percent in 2014 – the lowest in the Nordics and a long way behind Iceland’s 64 percent.

The National Food Institute has worked with researchers from Finland, Iceland, Norway and Sweden to produce the report concerning diet, physical exercise and obesity on behalf of the Nordic Council of Ministers.

Here is the report (in English).