ABSTRACT
The rising number of overweight and obese individuals, amid concomitant threats to public health and mounting pressures on health care costs, has become a serious global issue with public health officials devoting increasing attention to prevention strategies. It is also within this food area that the diversity in approach and understanding between public policy and advocacy on the one side and individual behaviour on the other show the widest gaps. Mortality also increases sharply once the threshold to being overweight is crossed. The food industry has acknowledged the increasingly serious health situation, and has responded by introducing lite food alternatives and conveying the risk of overeating by giving serving size suggestions. Overweight and obese populations are without question a growing global problem. Between 1980 and 2013, the prevalence of worldwide obesity increased substantially, from around 29 to 37 per cent in adult males and from 30 to 38 per cent in adult females.
