Farm to Plate, A system’s Approach
Puja Laginya Raghuraman
Diwekar’s Unique Selling Point
Rujuta Diwekar is a renowned nutritionist, fitness consultant and an author. In a video titled, “Live Q&A: Losing weight, Desi style”, Diwekar engages in a conversation where she talks about methods of losing weight, in India. What marks Diwekar distinct among other nutritionists and fitness consultant, is her unique diet plans, which involve Butter, Ghee and local, indigenous food. In this particular interview, she takes a system’s approach to losing weight and talks about nations and GDPs and improving the country’s health and economy.
Taking a system’s approach to eating right.
Using the system’s thinking terminologies, one would find a lot of positive loops and reinforcing loops in her system’s approach. For example, one positive loop is the loop that is formed by the Indian farmer with the “wealthy Indian citizen”. Her mantra is , “Eat local, Think Global”. According to Diwekar, If the wealthy Indian stops buying imported food, and starts eating local, he/she will benefit from the food as they keep his body healthy, but he also helps create a demand for locally produced food which benefits the Indian farmer. This demand and supple loop is a positive loop as they reinforce the availability of each other. Furthermore she mentions the multiple benefits for the farmer if he/she cultivates local pulses. As local pulses increase the nitrogen content in the soil, each harvest will only leave the soil rich with nutrients, ready for the next season, unlike foreign crops that absorbs all the nutrients and leaves the soil barren.
She also takes a bird’s eye view of diseases. She calls Diabetes and obesity the two biggest diseases in India and jointly names them “Diabesity”. She says, people usually think that the two diseases are individual problems that each person is responsible for. But according to her, these are collective issues for the nation. Better infrastructure that provide more footpaths and better access to parks and playgrounds are an important aspect in keeping the citizen’s health. In the same breath, she strongly adds that the Ministry of Agriculture and the Ministry of Health must collaborate and come up with holistic policies that benefit the country.
A leverage point that she has found, lies in schools. She says to encourage healthy eating, she approaches school and teaches young children the benefits of healthy eating. She uses different methods to do so, which are light and are captured in her audience’s mind easily. The Grandma Test, which urges the eater to ask themselves if their grandmother considers the food as food, and the Food miles test, which says that the further is the distance traveled by the food from farm to plate, further is your belly button from your spine.
Reflection on the video
A lot of Rujuta’s advice can be found in her audience’s own memory but in the voices of their mothers and grandmothers.Thus, this reassurance, combined with the validation of a western education, keeps her clients engaged and believe in her methods of diets and training. Rujuta Diwekar’s approach to a problem is commendable but one can not but think of what she herself considers as an ideal body, if she does and what she hopes for her “clients”. Is there an ideal body, that the media portrays, which she helps her clients achieve, or is she aiming for a better “bigger picture”? She also does not mention Non-vegetarian food, even though it has been an integral part of traditional Indian food in many regions of the country.
But one thing is very clear in her discourse, the solutions for the “ problem of food and diseases”, involve systemic change.
REFERENCES
