Editorial: Emerging topics in dietary assessment – Edition II (original) (raw)

2022, Frontiers in Nutrition

Editorial on the Research Topic Emerging topics in dietary assessment-Edition II Quantitative dietary assessment is a cross-cutting theme (1) for several research fields: nutrition, nutritional epidemiology, clinical trials, intervention studies, health and disease, food chain evaluation, consumer behavior, dietary risk assessment, dietary security, and adequacy, as it represents the first step in studies where the diet plays a role. Quantitative evaluation and qualitative understanding allow for identifying food styles to provide a sound scientific information basis for policymakers, educators, citizens, and food system actors (2). Emerging topics can also be identified following the surveillance and monitoring programs collating secondary data delivered from national statistic bureaus [e.g., (3)]. New indicators can also be proposed to the scientific community. As an example, variables related to the evaluation of diet environmental impact have been recently included in the dietary guidelines and then dietary assessment was also adapted to cope with this issue (4, 5). The complexity of dietary assessment is high due to its inherent nature, and, overall requires an information system based on several databases like (a) food nomenclatures and coding systems to classify and aggregate foods, and subsequently dietary exposure to contaminants/residues/other harmful substances, (b) recipes to disaggregate into ingredients, (c) portion sizes to quantify the intake, (d) food composition tables to assess energy and nutrients intake, and an (e) adequate software to manage from data entry to data processing, including rules to codify all variables (precision, classes of values) (6). Articles in this Emerging Topics in Dietary Assessment-edition II cover some crucial aspects of this methodological challenge so adding interesting topics further than the previous edition (7). Complexity deals with determinants and impacts, but also contexts where the surveys are conducted. Particularly, nationwide individual food consumption surveys like those representing the objective of the EU-Menu program undertaken