Eating with Family: Promoting the Development of 10,000 Mexican Families - FEMSA
Press Release

Eating with Family: Promoting the Development of 10,000 Mexican Families

Monterrey, February 15th, 2017. – Food Banks of Mexico (BAMX for its acronyms in Spanish), FEMSA Foundation and University of Monterrey (UDEM) presented the Eating with Family Program at the Roberto Garza Sada Center facilities. The institutions got together with the purpose of boosting the development of 10,000 families, improving their health and promoting the healthy cooking habits using regional products.

Eating with Family seeks to empower women and caregivers who come to food banks to become agents of change in their families. Through workshops that follow their own methodology, the beneficiaries develop abilities that allow them to improve the nutritional status and health of their families by considering the customs, culinary traditions, socioeconomic resources and cultural, environmental and gastronomic aspects of Mexico.

Experts from UDEM were in charge of designing a multidisciplinary methodology to address the nutritional problems of families with scarce resources. In addition, as part of this program, the involved organizations train Food Banks of Mexico facilitators for them to be able to apply the program at communities through a manual that helps integrate popular knowledge with scientific information. Through this methodology that also includes monitoring and evaluating of results, these organizations seek to strengthen healthy eating behavior in caregivers and their families.

“Through science and multi-sector collaboration, the University of Monterrey promotes the creation of knowledge to face the country’s current challenges. Eating with Family is an example of an intervention that teaches how eating habits can be improved and thus ensure family well-being”, said University of Monterrey Rector, Dr. Antonio José Dieck Assad.

Eating with Family consists of 24 cooking workshops that are taught every two weeks throughout a year at communities from 11 states, including Chiapas, Guanajuato, Nuevo León and Veracruz. During these workshops, which have a psychoeducational constructivist approach, caregivers are encouraged to resume healthy eating practices to promote their families’ well-being, especially the development of children from the earliest years.

“We know that developing programs that incorporate child development concepts into nutritional education has much more effective results than working exclusively on promoting healthy eating habits. Through the Eating with Family program, we empower mothers to offer healthy and rich food alternatives to their children and families, as well as warm environments and interactions to drive their full development”, said FEMSA Foundation Director, Mariano Montero.

The elaboration of dishes is the vehicle to promote a healthy diet, recovering the Mexican food culture that includes the habits of preparing food at home, eating with family or friends and, above all, enjoying the taste of food. With this initiative, the beneficiaries manage to make the most out of the food packages delivered to the banks, preventing malnutrition due to deficiencies or excess of nutrients.

Eating with Family recipe books are built by each beneficiary along with his or her instructor, session by session, and are kept in a box. As an object, the box-recipe book occupies a visible place within the kitchen, serving as an evocation of coexistence and family traditions.

“The launch of the recipe book will historically mark the direction of nutrition and food habits for our families”, concluded Food Banks of Mexico President, Federico González Celaya.


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