Food-based dietary guidelines for Finland – a staged approach

The history of recommending certain food composition to the diet of the general public in Finland goes back to the 1950s. Since that time, the food circle with modifications has been the only official, and most widely used, tool for diet composition visualization for nutrition education. Official national dietary recommendations and guidelines have been launched in 1981, 1987 and the newest ones in 1998. Nordic Nutrition Recommendations have been used in Finland as a reference when national dietary guidelines have not been available or up to date. Specific quantitative food-based dietary guidelines have not been given, because dietary guidelines may be reached with a wide range of foods. Data from the 1992 Dietary Survey of Finnish Adults was used to identify differences in dietary intake and food consumption patterns between subgroups of the study population that represented the highest and lowest quartiles of fat, saturated fatty acid (SFA), fibre, and fruit and vegetable intake. The population groups having the lowest fat or SFA intakes or the highest fibre or fruit and vegetable intakes reached the nutrient recommendations of macronutrients and fibre reasonably well. Similarities in food consumption pattern associated with a nutrient profile close to the recommendations were high consumption of fruit, berries, vegetables, roots, legumes and rye. Differences, e.g. in fats used, were also found between diets that were close to the nutrient recommendations. More research is needed to determine the differences in food consumption patterns of different population groups before developing food-based dietary guidelines for these groups.