Since I was a child, my parents insisted that I eat healthy: many fruits, vegetables, legumes, fish and only a limited quantity of meat.

As I grew older, I saw how my food could affect my sports performance and even my mood, feeling much more energetic when I ate well. Searching more about the subject of healthy diet, I came across the "Mediterranean diet," which regardless of its name, it not commonly followed in today's Mediterranean countries like Greece.

Mediterranean diet is not about individual "magic" dietary components that are best for health, such as whole grains. It is associated with dietary patterns that are heavy based on fresh and homegrown foods instead of processed goods, many of them produced by genetically modified food. This pattern can be described in the form of a pyramid. On the bottom level there are fruits, vegetables, grains (mostly whole), olive oil, beans, nuts, legumes, seeds, herbs and spices. On the next level there are fishes and seafood. Next come poultry, yogurt, eggs and cheese, and on the small top there are meat and sweets.

This construction was modeled after World War II, when a study led by Ancel Keys of the Mayo Foundation studied the eating habits and the health of almost 13,000 middle-aged men in the US, Japan, Italy, Greece , the Netherlands, Finland, and Yugoslavia. Surprisingly, the study revealed that well-fed American men had higher rates of heart diseases than those in countries whose diets had been restricted by the deprivations of war. Indeed, people living in the Greek island of Crete, one of the poorest areas in the study, were the ones with the best cardiovascular health (though, a more physically challenging way of living could also play its part in making them healthier).

Actually, this article is not mainly about promoting health habits. What I would like to conclude is that the home grown food, fresh vegetables and grain, as well as easy to find locally legumes and fish, are not only very good for our health, but they are also the basic ingredients of an ecological way of life with the smallest possible human footprint. When a kg of beef meat needs 15 tones of water to be produced, while 1 kg of fruits needs from 0,2 to 1,5 tones, we may understand how much Mediterranean diet can benefit the environment.

Moreover, local food needs minimum transportation and processing meaning less GH gasses and less pollution to the environment. Therefore, this diet, apart from being crucial for health and longevity, is also eco-friendly, more economical and an example more people should follow.