What do you know about the type of foods you eat most?

By Atok Dan Baguoot



It would be a surprise to learn that organic and inorganic food substances form the major supply of food stuffs on the market today. Food produce without synthetic chemicals is minimal on the market since what imported from Uganda and northern Sudan is purely fertilizers’ grown food. Its chemical contents are almost 90% compared to our home grown African crops under traditional agricultural methods of production. In my rural home town of Parieng, thousands of hectares of land were then ploughed by traditional farmers and grow traditional African crops without fertilizers yet the lands could yield good harvest without exhaustion easily.



That art of hard work has faded off in favour of laziness hidden in pretext of modernization. Our people didn’t use to go to hospitals whenever they were sick simply because their immune system was strong enough to defend them from any attack. Sicknesses like malaria and other typical African sicknesses were tolerated or get cure through local medicines. And the reasons were because of the quality of food they eat comparatively to us who eat modern food and with accessibility of modern medicines,



My recent discussions with the director of Sudanese Standards and Metrology Organizations, Mr. Majak Deng Kuol taught me how dangerous it is to go about eating while you do not know the quality and health impact pose by the food your are eating. It has been a recent acquired culture among the Southern Sudanese that eating bread in local restaurants is a civilization. In Juba today, nobody can tell me that s/he eats at home at day time especially during working days and hours of the week. Traditional cooking style in the house is substituted with buying already baked bread on the market. Those who still adhere to cooking in their houses only prepare the soup and get bread at the nearby kiosk. Laziness is promoted to its climax. Even bridegrooms don’t bother to prepare traditional dishes for their brides as before. It is those who are financially crippled who dare cooking both soup and Acida/ugali and kisera for that matter.



Sodas of varieties and tined water are served at every meal instead of tape water with natural contents. Immediate adverse experience with frequently taking of soda and eating all these sorts of inorganic food substances which are almost junks if not is heartburn.



What I would like to share with you today is the adverse effects of frequent eating of high chemical contained breads and sodas of different brands. In fact, for a bread to be baked there is need to have at least yeast known as potassium bromide in it to flavour both the taste and swollen it size as seen. Medical practitioners know the side effect long use of this chemical to your health. Contact one of them. Cancer is one of the effects associated with as a result of the dangerous chemical. Mr. Majak told me retarded thinking ability among infants another. This actually accounts to why cancer was a dominant disease in northern part of Sudan.



Bread/haash has been the daily meal for almost since the establishment of modern towns in the north. In the South and other parts of country where traditional type of foods were eaten, it is minimal although few cases that had been there were more genetic. High carbonated sodas do also cause what I cannot tell but I hope you know how you normally feel when you have taken much. In functions, those who don’t take hot drinks find it difficult after they have taken much soda in the process of accompanying the occasion to its end.



Besides stressful situation of sodas and bread, eating expired imported food is also at the rise. As much of our daily food is imported from multi-directional pathways, we are always suspicious of the quality of food we consume. Is it expired or not is a normal question. Without it being expired from the manufacturers’ calendar, poor storage facility also affects and alter the quality and taste of that very food substance.

Your health digest is to know your natural physiological needs in order to live your days allocated to you happily instead of becoming regular goer to hospitals. “Health is wealth” therefore, you have that inalienable rights to question on quality of food you eat in spite of your financial circumstances.

“He who can take advice is sometimes superior to him who can give it”, Karl Von Knebel.



Atok Dan is a journalist working with Southern Sudan Radio & TV and can be reached at atokfuture@gmail.com