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Despite the well-known positive effects of fruits and vegetables, their consumption in many countries is lower than those recommended. This study aims to systematically examine the effects of community-based interventions on fruits and vegetables consumption in adults.

To collect relevant publications, the authors searched electronic databases including PubMed/MEDLINE, Scopus and Web of Science from January 2000 to July 2021. Considering random models, this study analyzed the data using weighted mean differences (WMD) and 95% confidence intervals (CI).

Among 1,621 retrieved publications, 21 articles met the inclusion criteria. The overall effect size demonstrated that, at the end of the trials, the educational interventions increased the consumption of aggregated fruits and vegetables (WMD: 0.55 serving/day, 95%CI: 0.34, 0.77), and vegetables (WMD: 0.15, 95%CI: 0.09, 0.21, I2: 33.2%; p = 0.103) in the intervention groups, compared to the control groups.

The subgroup analyses that were based on the type of interventions (face-to-face education compared to online interventions), location (home-based compared to the other types of interventions) and duration (24 weeks and higher) of interventions, and accompanied financial support reduced between-group heterogeneity. An efficient interventional program on increasing fruits and vegetables consumption should be part of a multi-component project.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, no systematic review and meta-analysis has provided a summary of the effects of community-based interventions on fruits and vegetables consumption in adult populations, and there is no fixed conclusion that could be drawn in this regard.

Apples have always been considered a healthy product able to provide curative properties to consumers. In Italy, there is a long tradition of apple consumption and production both as a fresh product and as processed food. However, as with many other products, the consumption of fruits and vegetables and, more specifically apples, has been drastically affected by the first lockdown in 2020. In this project, the authors investigate whether the change in consumption habits had long-lasting consequences beyond 2020 and what are the main eating motivations, food-related behavior and socio-demographic affecting the consumption of fruits and vegetables after the pandemic.

The authors ran two online surveys with 1,000 Italian consumers across a year (from October 2021 to December 2022). In the study, participants answered questions about their consumption habits and their eating motives. Out of 1,000 consumers, the authors included in the final analysis only the participants who answered both surveys, leaving a final sample of 651 consumers.

The results show that participants have allocated more budget to fruit and vegetables after the lockdown than before it. Moreover, consumers reported an average increase in the consumption of apples. However, the increase was more pronounced for people aged between 30 and 50 years old and identified as female. After showing the difference across time, a cluster analysis identified three main segments that differ in their eating motives, place of purchase and area of residence.

Overall, the results contribute to a better understanding of how the global pandemic is still affecting people's daily life. Moreover, the findings can be used to guide the marketing and communication strategies of companies in the food sector.

To the best of the authors' knowledge, this is the first study that investigates changes in the consumption of fruits and vegetables, and, more specifically, apples, in Italy more than one year after the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic. Moreover, the study proposes a classification of consumers based on their habits in a time frame during which the COVID-19 wave was at its bottom which is not currently present in the literature.

Adequate vegetable consumption is fundamental to a healthy balanced diet; however, global compliance with recommendations is poor which is particularly important for young adults as they form food consumption habits. There is a growing interest in the circular economy of hospitality and sustainability of current dietary patterns in light of climate change and an expanding global population. The food value chain needs to be considered both vertically and horizontally where the research and development (R&D) investment is optimised by being “joined up” and not fragmentary; in addition, consumer trade-offs of health vs for example sensory appeal are taken into consideration. The purpose of this study was to identify factors predicting acceptance of vegetable dishes by young adults and present a roadmap that can be used for dish development and healthful marketing.

This study used the health belief model (HBM) as framework to investigate key factors that encourage vegetable intake by young adults using an online questionnaire sample of 444 enrolled in undergraduate programs at universities in Brazil.

Structural modelling showed that vegetable consumption frequency was positively influenced by Health concerns, Naturalness and Self-efficacy (including cooking skills), whereas Sensory factors and Familiarity demonstrated a negative loading that might be related to unpleasantness.

Globally, there is a strong need to promote the consumption of vegetables as a public health policy priority but also to ameliorate barriers to action that could be facilitated by availability, dish development and healthful marketing in hospitality operations.

Background: Evidence suggests that people living in poverty often experience inadequate nutrition with short and long-term health consequences. Whilst the diets of low-income households have been subject to scrutiny, there is limited evidence in the UK on the diet quality and food practices of households reporting food insecurity and food bank use. We explore lived experiences of food insecurity and underlying drivers of diet quality among low-income families, drawing upon two years of participatory research with families of primary school age children.

Methods: We report on a mixed-methods study of the relationship between low income, food bank use, food practices and consumption from a survey of 612 participants, including 136 free text responses and four focus groups with 22 participants. The research followed a parallel mixed-methods design: qualitative and quantitative data were collected separately, although both were informed by participatory work. Quantitative data were analysed using binary and multinomial logistic regression modelling; qualitative data were analysed thematically.

Results: Lower income households and those living with food insecurity struggle to afford a level of fruit and vegetable consumption that approaches public health guidance for maintaining a healthy diet, despite high awareness of the constituents of a healthy diet. Participants used multiple strategies to ensure as much fruit, vegetable and protein consumption as possible within financial constraints. The quantitative data suggested a relationship between higher processed food consumption and having used a food bank, independent of income and food security status.

Conclusions: The findings suggest that individualised, behavioural accounts of food practices on a low-income misrepresent the reality for people living with poverty. Behavioural or educational interventions are therefore likely to be less effective in tackling food insecurity and poor nutrition among people on a low income; policies focusing on structural drivers, including poverty and geographical access to food, are needed.

This study aimed to investigate changes in food consumption during the COVID-19 lockdown period in a sample of female college students in China. The study employed a dual processing approach that simultaneously investigates the effects of students' beliefs about the importance of healthy eating and the effect of emotional eating due to anxiety induced by the pandemic.

Data were collected from 645 female college students in China using a self-administered questionnaire. Structural equation modeling was used for the data analysis.

Beliefs about the importance of healthy eating have a greater impact on changes in food consumption than anxiety. Emotional eating was positively associated with changes in vegetable consumption. The findings reveal that a shift from “food as health” to “food as well-being” in the role of food in the food-related life of Chinese consumers is underway. “Food as health” remains important in food-related decision-making in China during the pandemic. Concurrently, a well-being centered or a more holistic perspective, including the psychological and emotional aspects of food, should be included in food-related research and health promotion in China.

This study contributes to the literature on reactions to the COVID-19 pandemic by simultaneously investigating both the cognitive impact of beliefs regarding the importance of healthy eating and the affective impact of anxiety on changes in food consumption due to COVID-19.

This research aims to reach meaningful insights into fruit consumption motives. The study articulates contextual motives observed through inherent fruit characteristics (i.e. attributes and benefits) with personal motives that transcend the situation (i.e. emotions and cultural values).

This qualitative study used the focus group technique comprising eight groups of eight to 10 subjects (n = 94). The participants were frequent fresh-fruit consumers.

The analysis differentiates contextual motives from transituational ones. Older participants are motivated by taking care of health matters. They value fruit as an expression of their determination to take action and care for others. Younger participants are motivated by the experience of pleasure. Fruits have a hedonic value related to joy, being refreshing and tasteful.

Results serve marketers and decision-makers to better target motivations for fruit consumption enhancement. These motivations could be implemented by communicating specific fruit attributes that respond to short-term needs. In the long run, marketers could create fruit consumption campaigns that respond to deeper consumer values.

Designing fruit consumption campaigns aligned with individuals' motives could effectively strengthen the adoption of a healthy lifestyle. This study is helpful from the aspect of a public-policy approach expected to improve public health.

Consumers' fruit preference transcends tangible product characteristics to motives aligned with their goals, emotions and human values. This path merges two approaches: contextual motivations and the Means-end chain model. The first approach recognises short-term observable product characteristics, whereas the latter works on long-term values.

Ulam is a traditional salad that contains high levels of antioxidants and is commonly consumed in raw form. However, the average ulam consumption among the low-income Malaysian population was only ½ serving daily. Thus, this study aimed to explore the motivators and barriers to ulam consumption among residents of low-cost housing areas (household income RM4849 or $1015.50) in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.

Six focus group discussions were conducted with 27 Malay residents aged 18–59 years in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. The researchers asked the participants a series of semi-structured questions. All the interviews were audio-recorded and transcribed verbatim. Two researchers coded the transcripts independently, and several themes were identified. The data were analysed using Nvivo version 12 software.

Three main factors for ulam consumption were identified in this study: personal, environmental and behavioural. The motivators and barriers were identified based on nine main themes and 16 sub-themes.

The results of this study identified potential areas for an effective intervention to increase ulam intake among residents in low-cost housing areas.

This work has the potential to identify the factors that have an impact on consumers' ulam preferences to help fulfil daily vegetable recommendations.

Despite its health benefits, vegetable consumption is low in urban Nigeria. Interventions have been successful in increasing urban Nigerians' vegetable intake in the home environment, but interventions doing so for popular out-of-home consumption are lacking. This study aimed to design, implement and assess an intervention to increase the vegetable intake of urban Nigerians through street foods.

A quasi-experimental design was applied in Lagos, Nigeria. During the intervention, 12 trained street food vendors (SFVs) actively promoted the health benefits of vegetables to their customers (using marketing statements and posters) and provided the option to buy an additional green leafy vegetables (GLVs) side dish to their meal. Purchases were observed, and a survey was conducted before and during the intervention to measure perceived meal quality and satisfaction. Six to eight weeks after the intervention, a mystery shopper visited the vendor to assess if they were still selling additional GLVs.

Almost half (46%) of the 1,506 observed customers bought additional GLVs during the intervention. Both at baseline (N = 452) and during intervention (N = 564), meal satisfaction was high. Users were on average more educated and older than non-users. Most vendors did not perceive the sale of additional GLVs as additional work. Six to eight weeks after the intervention, nine vendors (75%) were still selling additional GLVs.

This study showed that SFVs informing consumers on the potential health benefits of vegetables and offering these vegetables in street food dishes at a commercially viable price is an interesting option to increase vegetable intake.

Covid-19 is a serious threat to the dietary quality of vulnerable communities in developing countries with limited economic resources. This study explored the implications of COVID-19 on daily dietary behavior and food consumption patterns of perishable and nonperishable food commodities based on the gender of household headship in Pakistan.

The data was collected through an online survey using the snowball sampling technique. A mixed design ANOVA, an independent t-test and a multivariate probit model were used to look at the data from 417 female-headed households and 1,131 male-headed households that were surveyed in the study.

Female-headed households experienced a greater decrease in their daily intake of perishable and nonperishable food commodities compared to male-headed households during COVID-19. The decrease in consumption of perishable food commodities was greater than the decrease in nonperishable food commodities for both female-headed and male-headed households. Female-headed households witnessed the largest decrease in daily intake of animal-derived foods, while male-headed households observed the highest diminution in consumption of fruits. Female-headed households and male-headed households reduced their consumption of perishable food commodities by more than one-third and one-fifth, respectively. Households with lower socioeconomic status reported higher reductions in their daily intakes of food commodities compared to households with higher socioeconomic status.

The cross-sectional nature of the collected data does not allow the development of a causal relationship between COVID-19 implications and food consumption changes in daily dietary patterns.

Dietary and consumption patterns of populations are changing worldwide due to COVID-19. There is no study to assist policymakers in determining how COVID-19 is affecting the daily food consumption patterns of perishable and non-perishable food commodities of households based on gender in the developing world.

This study aimed to explore the association of childhood experience of being forced to eat – where a particular person forced a child to eat a specific food item against one's will – on food consumption, especially vegetables later in young adulthood.

An online questionnaire survey was conducted from 19 to 24 February 2020 with 1,277 young Korean adults in their 20s. A total of 1,226 eligible responses were obtained, wherein 410 (33.4%) responses with forced-eating experiences in childhood were collected. To answer the survey questionnaire, the respondents were asked to recall one of the most memorable forced-eating episodes.

The results showed that forced-eating occurred mostly among lower grades or pre-schoolers, at home or in schools/childcare facilities, and by parents or homeroom teachers. Vegetables were the most common target food for forced-eating. The Forced-Eating-Experienced group with vegetables as the target food tended to have significantly lower preference for and acceptance of vegetables. Furthermore, among this group, those who had displayed unpleasant post-ingestion physical symptoms after forced-eating or refused to eat the target vegetables at all despite forced-eating, showed significantly lower acceptance of vegetables. Additionally, they were also less likely to eat the target vegetable at present, but more likely to agree that their current dietary habits were affected by their childhood experiences of forced-eating.

The study attempted to fill the knowledge gap on the association of negative childhood experiences of forced-eating with food consumption, especially vegetables, later in young adulthood.