Eco-Bananas and Daley Nutrition Partnership
March 10, 2017
Currently only 1 in 20 children (5.1%) meet the fruit and veg daily guidelines (1). Shockingly 30-41% of a typical child’s diet is now filled with discretionary junk food choices such as sugary drinks, sweet biscuits, chocolate, pies, processed meats etc.
Daley Nutrition, owned and run by Luke and Carly Daley, is working with Victorian schools to improve the knowledge of both kids and their parents re: how to eat a balanced diet, where food comes from, and cooking skills. To achieve this they partnered with Queensland’s Ecoganics® farmers, Frank and Dianne Sciacca. This allows them to run the school workshops and educate pupils about fruit and veg, and provide free ecoganics® red-tip bananas to the students.
The free eco-bananas are provided during most workshops as a snack or blended into a smoothie during the Oral Health workshops to back up key points about healthy drinks. Luke Daley, Co-Founder of Daley Nutrition & Registered Nutritionist says that “bananas offer a perfect snack for children as they contain potassium that helps working muscles and brains, vitamin-B6 which is great for protein digestion and energy production, and also is a great slow releasing carbohydrate source due to its fibre content. And let’s not forget that bananas were the snack of choice of Rafael Nadal at the Australian open!”
Daley describes the opportunity as “a perfect partnership”. He says, “having the free bananas to offer to pupils connects them with the literature and activities we teach and creates a healthy, fun, and sustainable approach to health”.
Daley Nutrition’s workshops are designed to empower children with the knowledge of nutrition and the Australian Dietary Guidelines in an interactive and engaging way. Currently, they run two intervention activities to visually demonstrate the amount of sugar contained in popular drinks and cereal products. Daley Nutrition created these educational games because children aged 2-18 years are the largest consumers of sugar sweetened beverages (47%) compared to adults (31%). Children aged 2-8 years are the highest consumers of sugary breakfast cereals according to the ABS. Education is the key to making healthier choices.
Ecoganics® is a balanced farming system created by Sciacca that works with nature to produce a healthy product while also protecting and strengthening the farm eco system. Traditional farming involves chemicals that sterilize the soil and kill insects (both beneficial and pests). These practises have a negative impact on the soil, produce grown, organisms, insects, birds, larger wildlife and the waterways. As Sciacca explains “ecoganics® invites all of natures creatures, big and small, to grow the bananas slowly, carefully and sustainably. This results in fruit that has a sweeter creamier flavour and a denser texture giving it a longer shelf life.”
Daley Nutrition is holding a media launch for this new partnership with Eco-Bananas. They will be facilitating their longest running workshop, Snack Art, with the 3-4 year old kinder group at not-for-profit community run Chelsea Occasional Child Care.
Eco-Bananas and Ecoganics® supply retail outlets Nationally in all capital cities. Ecoganic® delivers a sustainable marketing system supplying to market need, underpinned by a sustainable farming system our business includes, production, research, education and agricultural services.
