Healthy Diet Factsheet
A healthy diet is essential for preventing malnutrition and noncommunicable diseases (NCDs) such as diabetes, heart disease, stroke, and cancer. Unhealthy diets and lack of physical activity are leading global health risks.
Key Facts
- A healthy diet helps protect against malnutrition in all its forms, as well as NCDs.
- Unhealthy diet and lack of physical activity are leading global risks to health.
- Healthy dietary practices start early in life – breastfeeding fosters healthy growth and improves cognitive development, and may have longer-term health benefits, like reducing the risk of becoming overweight or obese and developing NCDs later in life.
- Energy intake (calories) should be in balance with energy expenditure. Evidence indicates that total fat should not exceed 30% of total energy intake to avoid unhealthy weight gain, with a shift in fat consumption away from saturated fats to unsaturated fats, and towards the elimination of industrial trans fats.
- Limiting intake of free sugars to less than 10% of total energy intake is part of a healthy diet. A further reduction to less than 5% of total energy intake is suggested for additional health benefits.
- Keeping salt intake to less than 5 g per day helps prevent hypertension and reduces the risk of heart disease and stroke in the adult population.
- WHO Member States have agreed to reduce the global population’s intake of salt by 30% and halt the rise in diabetes and obesity in adults and adolescents as well as in childhood overweight by 2025.
Components of a Healthy Diet
A healthy diet includes:
- Fruits, vegetables, legumes (e.g., lentils, beans), nuts, and whole grains (e.g., unprocessed maize, millet, oats, wheat, brown rice).
- At least 400 g (5 portions) of fruits and vegetables a day. Potatoes, sweet potatoes, cassava, and other starchy roots are not classified as fruits or vegetables.
- Less than 10% of total energy intake from free sugars, which is equivalent to 50 g (or around 12 level teaspoons) for a person of healthy body weight consuming approximately 2000 calories per day. Ideally, less than 5% of total energy intake for additional health benefits.
- Keeping salt intake to less than 5 g per day to prevent hypertension and reduce the risk of heart disease and stroke.
Global Action Plan for NCDs
In 2013, the World Health Assembly (WHA) agreed to nine global voluntary targets for the prevention and control of NCDs, including a halt to the rise in diabetes and obesity and a 30% relative reduction in the intake of salt by 2025. The “Global Action Plan for the Prevention and Control of Noncommunicable Diseases 2013–2020” provides guidance and policy options for Member States, WHO, and other UN agencies to achieve these targets.
The Second International Conference on Nutrition (ICN2) in November 2014 adopted the Rome Declaration on Nutrition and the Framework for Action, which recommends a set of policy options and strategies to promote diversified, safe, and healthy diets at all stages of life.
WHO is helping countries implement these recommendations to promote healthy dietary practices and reduce the burden of NCDs globally.
