Dietary habits in Italy: the importance of the Mediterranean diet.

The Mediterranean diet is the heritage of millennia of exchange of people, cultures and foodstuffs throughout the Mediterranean basin. This diet is characterized by abundance of vegetables and fruits, bread, fish, olive oil, poultry, a relatively low consumption of red meat and a moderate consumption of wine during a meal and is well-defined by the food pyramid. Nowadays a standard Western diet has become far more common in Italy, against Mediterranean diet, which stands as a model of health sustainability: it is therefore necessary also to promote suitable resource management and to support quality in food. Practical and large scale projects should be activated, aimed to produce advice about meals both for families and for the different kinds of community, respectively.