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Past, present, and future of the food Guide Pyramid

2001; Elsevier BV; Volume: 101; Issue: 8 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1016/s0002-8223(01)00217-6

1878-3570

Carole Davis, Patricia Britten, Esther F. Myers,

Consumer Attitudes and Food Labeling

The above statement was made by a consumer as part of a USDA-sponsored focus group on the Dietary Guidelines ( (1) Report of the Initial Focus Groups on Nutrition and Your Health: Dietary Guidelines for Americans, Fourth Edition. Systems Assessment and Research, Inc.; U.S. Dept. of Agriculture, Center for Nutrition Policy and Promotion, Washington, D.C; 1999. Google Scholar ).To those who still consider the Pyramid to be “new,” statements like these remind us that the Pyramid has been around a while—since 1992, to be exact. Young adults learned about the Pyramid in school, and many have seen it on food packages for a number of years. The Pyramid, arguably the most well known food guide in history, will be 10 years old next year. We are taking this opportunity to look back at how and why the Pyramid was originally developed, a summary of its uses, and how understanding the origins of the Pyramid will help guide efforts to reassess and potentially revise it in the future.