The MedDiet 4.0 framework

The notion of the Mediterranean Diet has undergone a progressive evolution over the past 50 years – from a healthy dietary pattern to a new model of sustainable diet. This paper presents the Med Diet 4.0 as a comprehensive sustainable Mediterranean diet model, in which three additional sustainable dimensions - environmental, socio-cultural and economic - are incorporated and valorized together with its well documented health and nutrition benefits. The Med Diet 4.0 aims also to highlights the value of the Mediterranean diet as an outstanding sustainable resource for the Mediterranean countries to enhance the sustainability of their food systems. The Med Diet 4.0 model was developed within the ongoing FAO/CIHEAM case study on the Mediterranean diet as sustainable diet model. It is presented as an outcome of a historical collaborative effort by many of the co-authors and their institutions committed towards the enhancement of the Mediterranean diet heritage. In 2014, the International Foundation of Mediterranean Diet (IFMeD) was established as an international pole of multi-disciplinary knowledge and expertise as well as a guarantor for scientific, economic and institutional actors interested in supporting the Mediterranean Diet. As one of its priority activities, the Med Diet 4.0 model was developed with the aims to catalyse a renewed broader interest - from the general public, to policy makers and academia, as well as to foster broader multi-stakeholder partnerships for the advancement of the Mediterranean diet. Despite its increasing popularity worldwide, adherence to the Mediterranean diet is decreasing for multifactorial reasons – life styles changes, food globalization, economic and socio-cultural circumstances. These factors pose serious threats to the preservation and transmission of the Mediterranean diet heritage to present and future generations. Today’s challenge is to reverse these trends.