What's Really In Our Food?

Inside New Zealand



AIR DATE: 13-Sept-2007

New Zealanders eat a cocktail of food additives every day but don't realise that many of these additives are banned overseas, and we could be putting ourselves and our families at risk. Inside New Zealand investigated What’s Really In Our Food?

Take a look at the ingredient list of your favourite snack food and try to pronounce some of those multi-syllabic words. Do you know what soy lecithin, monosodium glutamate and sodium benzoate are?

With such massive chemical adulteration of the food we eat today, we are left asking: how safe is this chemical soup we call our ‘groceries’?

More than 4,000 additives are put in to the food we eat in New Zealand compared with the 3,000 added to foods sold throughout North America.

Even the standard Kiwi breakfast is chemical rich; our cereals, breads and drinks are full of artificial colours, sweeteners, preservatives and flavours, all of which independent experts say are behind an explosion of modern illnesses.

But what is even more worrying is that many of these additives are banned overseas. Like the food colouring amaranth. It has been linked to asthma, skin rashes and hyperactivity and is banned in many foreign countries.

Inside New Zealand dissects a typical Kiwi family’s diet, focusing on the amount of additives they consume and the health risks, while also demonstrating the psychology behind the use of additives and why food manufacturers use them.

Case studies reveal food additives that are responsible for debilitating illnesses or long term suffering, and in each case, people have reduced or eliminated the additives from their diet and experienced a remarkable improvement in their health.

Tune in to the eye opening documentary Inside New Zealand: What’s Really In Our Food?, screening Thursday, September 13 at 8:30pm.

PROGRAMME NOTES:
The book referenced during the show was 'The Chemical Maze – Your guide to food additives and cosmetic ingredients' by author Bill Stratham.

The copy of the book used for the show was sourced from Naturally Organic - http://www.naturallyorganic.co.nz/

Inside New Zealand Website
http://www.tv3.co.nz/Programmes/Reality/InsideNZ/tabid/86/articleID/33600/Default.aspx