Define Nutritional Requirements of Fats and Oils?
As with the other macronutrients, we do compute requirements of visible fats too for all age groups and give guidelines for selection of fats. For this, we must consider total fat intake, which includes both visible and invisible fat in food. A daily intake of 2400 Kcal Indian diet contains 40 g of fat where 25 g is invisible and 15 g is visible fat. This works out to be that invisible fat is 10 en 9% (=25 g x 9 Kcal s 2400, where, lg fat gives 9 Kcal). The upper income group, especially in urban areas tends to consume as high as 50 g of visible fat. Their invisible fat content also is about 30-50 g/d due to consumption of fat rich foods, whole milk and milk products. This urban group may exceed fat intake of more than 30 en% and show several risk factors of an early onset of heart disease. Let us look of fat requirements to meet minimum essential fatty acid requirements in all age groups. Let us start with adults.