Over well-polished white rice:

DA: consume nutritious

Brown, pigmented rice

TAGBILARAN CITY, Bohol, Nov 15 (PIA)— Dark is better than white.

Wait, this is not any racist slant, this is from the Department of Agriculture information officer Cheryl Dela Victoria, who advanced the National government’s campaign on Rice Awareness, and talking about the lost benefits of well-polished or more popularly well-milled rice, which turns white, but loses the nutrients that the body direly needs.

The campaign, to popularize brown rice, or essentially that source of the pearly white rice most people are consuming, and the pigmented varieties like the black and the red rice, which, with initial milling, only scrapes off the rice hull, and retains the bran, which lends its brown coloration, and has a higher fiber, protein and vitamins, over their re-processed siblings.

In the structure of the rice grain, in the brown rice, only the hulls which are the hard protective layer of the grain is removed during de-hulling.

This leaves the rice bran, or the thin layer next to the hull that contains fiber, minerals, vitamins and natural oils.

In fact, by additional re-milling of the brown rice to be white, it gets to the rice germ, which contains the concentrated vitamins, minerals, natural oils and that rich anti-oxidant which is popularly an anti-cancer remedy.

With the fiber in the bran and in the germ left, when eaten, since it holds water and many kinds of minerals, it delays the processing of the starch, which transforms into fats. In well milled rice, since it has polished the bran and the germ, when one consumes the endosperm which is all starch, the body easily transforms it to fats, which can be bad for sedentary people, explains nutritionist and dietician Ma. Maida Virtudazo.

Polishing rice or re-milling rice over and over to be white actually removes 15% of the proteins, 18% fats, 70% riboflavin which is involved in energy metabolism, cell respiration, antibody production, growth and development especially for the metabolism of carbohydrates, protein and fats.

White rice which is refined by polishing, strips it of its bran and germ, reducing its nutritional value.

“Turning the darker rice to white by polishing also loses 68% of niacin that transforms foot to energy, 90% calcium which strengthens the bone, 80% thiamine which is good in treating beriberi and countering memory loss, 75% phosphorus which helps in bone and teeth formation and 60% of other minerals in the grain,” the dietician explains.

Virtudazo, who comes from the National Nutrition Council in Region 7, says consuming brown rice helps reduce incidence of type 2 diabetes, cancer and cardio-vascular diseases as well as it lowers blood pressure.

For the favorite well-milled rice, what is left is that starchy part of the grain, which is easily transformed into fats.

Dela Victoria, who was speaking at the Association of United Development Information Officers Monthly Meeting at the Reynas Garden, and at the Kapihan sa PIA, cited that the Philippines is wasting 650 thousand tons of food that are thrown away, wasted during harvests, poorly treated that spoils fast, or lost to poor harvest and storage techniques, according to the Philippine Rice Research Institute.

Citing the Food and Nutrition Research Institute of the Department of Science and Technology, dela Victoria shared: every Filipino wastes one spoonful of rice, every day, which sums up to 5% of every household consumption.

“Rice has been a rich source of carbohydrates, the body’s main fuel source. Carbohydrates can keep you energized and satisfied and are important for fueling exercise. It is an excellent source of many nutrients, including fiber, manganese, selenium, magnesium, and B vitamins,” says Virtudazo.

Eating too much rice, also causes weight gain like if the calories are not burned off through exercise, it can be stored as fat in your body, or the starch converted into sugar can increased blood sugar levels leading to nutrient imbalance.

With the issues on rice sufficiency further pressing for the over consumption of rice, imposing DA also recommends diversifying carbohydrates, that instead of rice, the open options are sweet yam, cassava, corn, potato, ube, gabi, taro and other available rootcrops.

On the other hand, the NNC recommends the use of Platong Bol-anon, where ¼ of the plate is rice or its substitutes like camote, banana, ½ is fruits and vegetables like banana, papaya, vegetable stew with green and leafy vegetables and the other 1/4 is for the proteins like fish, eggs and meat when available. (RAHC/PIA-7/Bohol)

DARK IS BETTER. The campaign for the option to go for the highly nutritious brown or the pigmented rice over the overly polished and well milled rice which has lost 1/3 of its nutrient reverberates at the Kapihan sa PIA with DA Information Officer Cheryl dela Victoria and NNC-7 dietitian and nutritionist Ma. Maida Vitrudazo. (PIABohol)