What should we do about fruit and vegetables? Pulling fruit and vegetables back from extinction in the marketplace

Generally, the global human consumption of fruit and vegetables is less than required for optimal health. There are at least three sets of knowledge required to deal with this situation. First, there are several issues which relate to the properties of fruit and vegetables in the context of global public health challenges and the changing paradigms in human nutrition sciences. Second, there is increasing evidence about the importance of consumption factors such as dietary patterns and meal contents and contexts as well as changes in consumers' lifestyles relating to the rise of convenience products and the informalisation of food practices. It is essential to appreciate the needs and wants of different types of food consumers, and the contexts in which they purchase, prepare and consume fruit and vegetables. The different problems facing fruit versus vegetables will be described. Third, there are opportunities to arrest the decline in fruit and vegetable consumption at three levels: consumer decision-making, industry and government. For consumers, skills education, marketing at point of purchase and supportive communication systems for household gatekeepers may be useful. At the industry level, partnerships with health and consumer organisations, collaboration between growers of different fruit and vegetables, the creation of high quality products based on fruit and vegetables, and more concerted responses to market competitors are important strategies. At the government level, awareness raising campaigns, preferential purchasing, promotion of fruit and vegetables in a range of settings, and the application of public interest criteria to relevant policies, should be considered.