All fruits have power

By way of background, this was the exchange of letters in the press recently:

3 weekends ago, on Sep 4, the Sunday Times carried an article saying the Health Promotion Board has drawn up a list of 13 "powerhouse" fruits that are superior to all others, because they are rich in phytochemicals.

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I wrote the following letter to the editor which was published 2 weekends ago, Sep 11:

All fruits have power

The durian is supposed to be the king of fruits. Alas, it does not seem to have much power, for it failed to make it to the Health Promotion Board's list of 13 “powerhouse” fruits that are supposedly superior to all others (Power Play, ST 4 September).

Also failing to make the grade were the chiku, rambutan, duku-langsat, mangosteen, jackfruit, dragon fruit and most other tropical fruits. Are they all inferior? Is God or nature is so prejudiced against us as such that the best fruits are found in a Western, temperate climate, diet?

The real reason, I suspect, is that the HPB's list has been imported wholesale from either the US or UK, where scientists might not have even heard of, let alone studied, those tropical fruits that we enjoy when they are in season.

We are told that strawberry, cherry, orange, papaya, rockmelon, mango, pineapple, starfruit, kiwifruit, grapes and plum are the best fruits because they are more densely packed with phytonutrients than others.

Do we know this for a fact? Have scientists in Singapore and elsewhere in the tropics thoroughly analysed the phytonutrient content of durians and other tropical fruits?

Also, apart from phytonutrients, other factors need to be considered as well.

The US-based Environment Working Group has published a list of 12 fruits and vegetables that are most heavily contaminated with toxic pesticides. They are, in descending order: apples, bell peppers, celery, cherries, grapes, nectarines, peaches, pears, potatoes, red raspberries, spinach, and strawberries.

So unless we go organic, it may not be such a great idea to eat plenty of “powerhouse fruits” like cherries, grapes and strawberries.

Meanwhile, Patrick Holford, a UK-based nutritionist and author of The Optimum Nitrtion Bible, tells us that “An orange may provide between 0 mg and 180mg (of vitamin C) the average being around 60mg. Yes, it's true. Some supermarket oranges have spent so long in transit that they contain no vitamin C!"

So while an orange in the ideal world might be a “powerhouse fruit”, in the real world it may have lost most of its power. “Better” to eat fruits freshly harvested from our own backyards.

I write “better” between inverted commas because the whole idea of some fruits being better than others is, in fact, quite meaningless. It is equivalent to saying that electricians are better than carpenters, or that lawyers are better than doctors.

Each has its specific purpose and role to play.

I remember watching Michael Chang on TV the year he won the French Open tennis, and I remember seeing him eat bananas. Many endurance athletes do the same because bananas provide a quick supply of energy.

I remember also travelling in Europe in the early 1980s when there was a terrible heat wave. One afternoon in Italy, I gobbled down half a water melon and it left me feeling totally refreshed.

Would some pesticide laden grapes or plums have done a better job?

Richard Seah

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Finally on Sep 20 the HPB responded to my Forum letter with the following:

List of 13 'powerhouse' fruit not exhaustive

I REFER to the letter, 'All fruits have 'power' (The Sunday Times, Sept 11), by Mr Richard Seah.

The Health Promotion Board (HPB) supports the view that different varieties of fruit should be included as part of a total diet.

We would like to highlight that the list of 13 'powerhouse' fruit is not intended to be exhaustive but rather to illustrate the point that it is advisable to eat certain varieties of fruit that are brightly coloured more frequently than others.

There is good scientific evidence to suggest that fruit with coloured flesh are generally better sources of phytochemicals than those with white or pale-coloured flesh.

This has been borne out by laboratory analysis of phytochemical levels in different varieties of fruit, including many tropical fruit.

Those that make it to the 'powerhouse list' include mango, papaya, pineapple and jackfruit. HPB will certainly update the list as more data become available.

Phytochemicals often occur as colour pigments that give fruit their bright colours. Many phytochemicals function as powerful antioxidants in our body to help slow down the process of ageing and reduce the risk of developing chronic diseases such as certain cancers and heart disease.

The pesticide levels in food are carefully regulated and monitored by the Agri-Food & Veterinary Authority, and pose little risk to public health. Nevertheless, it is a good practice to wash fruit before eating or cooking. A combination of rinse, soak and rinse will help to remove pesticide residues.

Organically grown food also offers no nutritional advantages over non-organically grown food. Organic food refers to produce grown without the use of man-made fertilisers or pesticides. Nonetheless, individuals may have philosophical and environmental preferences on the way food is cultivated.

We thank Mr Seah for his feedback and would like to invite him and other interested members of the public to visit HPB's website www.hpb.gov.sg for more information on healthy living.


Dr Annie Ling
Head, Nutrition Department
Health Promotion Board

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I responded with another letter, to take issue with the statement about organic foods, which was published today, Sep 22:

Organic fruit and vegetables are superior

THE Head of Nutrition at the Health Promotion Board contradicts herself in her letter, 'List of 13 'powerhouse' fruit not exhaustive' (ST, Sept 20).

She talks about the value of phytochemicals in slowing down ageing, reducing the risks of chronic disease, etc, and tells us that 'phytochemicals often occur as colour pigments that give fruit their bright colours'.

Yet she goes on to make the totally unsubstantiated claim that 'organically-grown food ... offers no nutritional advantages over non-organically grown food'.

It is precisely because of the presence of phytochemicals that organic foods are obviously superior. In many cases, one glance is all it takes to see that organic fruit and vegetables have more colour pigments - and therefore more phytochemicals.

Organic versions of carrot, celery, etc, typically have deeper, darker colours, compared with regular, chemically-grown versions. Even a 'pale' vegetable like cauliflower - which has health-enhancing/disease-preventing value despite its paleness - is creamy yellow versus the chemically-grown version whose colour is closer to white.

Apart from visible - and taste - differences, there are, of course, scientific studies that show organic foods to be superior.

As long ago as the early 1900s, agricultural scientist Albert Howard demonstrated this when he raised cattle on organically-grown fodder, and then set them free to literally rub noses with cattle infected with foot- and-mouth disease. Nothing happened. His cattle did not get infected. Dr Howard conducted a series of similar experiments over a period of 16 years.

More recently, in February this year, European scientists at the Danish Research Centre for Organic Farming found that rats given an organic diet had a better immune system, slept more soundly and were slimmer than rats given conventional foods.

In February 2003, the Journal Agricultural Food Chemistry reported that organic corn, strawberries and marionberries had 'significantly higher levels of cancer-fighting antioxidants'.

I can go on and spend the entire day digging out scientific research about the value of organically-grown food. But this is a job more appropriate for the people at the Health Promotion Board.

Richard Seah

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Let's see what happens next....