Mexican government promotes the milpa diet

The Ministry of Health of the Government of Mexico recently published on its website an article dedicated to its program with the milpa diet, which makes visible the work that has been done in recent years in that country to promote this agricultural system, which serves basis for a healthy eating model.

“The milpa is one of the most sensible and productive agricultural techniques in the world, from the ecological and food safety points of view,” says the government in a publication that explains what the diet consists of and suggests recipes and menus both to strengthen the body’s defense system as to adopt in hospitals.

The milpa is a food productive agricultural system based on the polyculture of different products, generally corn, beans and squash, which has been the foundation of the Mesoamerican people and on which other activities are based. It not only generates food but fodder, medicinal and ornamental plants, and favors the conservation and sustainability of the soil, and has the support of multiple investigations by specialists in the fields of nutrition, biology, medicine and anthropology, as explained in the document Strengthening Health with Food, Exercise and Good Humor: The Milpa Diet. Healthy and Culturally Relevant Mesoamerican Food Model, published by the Ministry of Health.

As for the diet, it has elements of the diet of the original peoples, which positively impact the nutritional status of both healthy people and others with diseases. In addition, it is a food model based on food that is part of the identity of the territories, which takes into account the particularities of the human being, its geography and culture, and takes advantage of the biodiversity of each place.

Thus, the Mexican government has been constantly disseminating the benefits of the milpa and its diet as a healthy and tasty Mesoamerican care model, and proposes it as a way of influencing autonomy and appropriation of health in the hands of the people. common, both with food and with medicinal plants, and in a way to combat the nutritional epidemics that affect Mexico.

“The milpa diet has three characteristics: diversity, adaptability and integration, since it has a great wealth of elements, which can be adapted according to each region, and integrate others from different regions of both the country and the world,” says the government.