Seaweed is among the few meals that may credibly declare to be just right for each other folks and the planet. So why don’t westerners consume extra of it?
It’s wealthy in nutrients, minerals, omega-3 fatty acids and fibre. It grows with out fertilisers, insecticides or contemporary water, and calls for no farmland. Some species even seize carbon from the ambience and assist counter ocean acidification.
From an environmental and dietary point of view, seaweed turns out like an obtrusive selection for a sustainable nutrition. But in a lot of the west, it stays a perimeter factor, showing way more incessantly wrapped round sushi in a cafe than in a family’s weekly foods.
My staff has been investigating this hole between seaweed’s doable and its position in on a regular basis diets. Our goal used to be to determine why other folks in some international locations consume seaweed frequently and why others don’t.
Even actor Samuel L. Jackson has lately been selling the virtues of seaweed snacks sourced from reefs underneath offshore windfarms. However seaweed snacks are a long way from mainstream, particularly in international locations like the United Kingdom.
A contemporary windfarm promo featured actor Samuel L. Jackson sampling tasty seaweed snacks.
A few of my computational social science scholars labored with the Europe-wide seaweed affiliation North Sea Farmers to broaden a marketing campaign to inspire other folks within the Netherlands to consume extra seaweed. They temporarily realised that ahead of seeking to convince other folks to consume extra, it used to be essential to grasp the explanations they may not be consuming it already.
This query used to be the point of interest of our new find out about surveying other folks dwelling in each the United Kingdom (the place seaweed is never eaten) and Japan (the place this can be a day by day staple). Via evaluating the solutions, lets separate cultural familiarity from different social and mental components that would possibly affect intake.
We didn’t simply ask whether or not other folks consume seaweed. We explored how incessantly they consume it, how simple they believe it’s to shop for, how most likely they’re to consume it in long run, and the way wholesome they imagine it to be.
We additionally checked out their training, gender, age, political orientation, willingness to take dangers, ethnic background in the United Kingdom, and ranges of accept as true with in establishments. Those components are incessantly related to openness to new meals and may just assist give an explanation for variations between international locations.
Other people in the United Kingdom and Japan have other perspectives about consuming seaweed.
Viktor Kochetkov/Shutterstock
Some effects weren’t too sudden. Jap respondents ate seaweed way more incessantly than their British opposite numbers, discovered it more uncomplicated to shop for, and have been extra keen to consume it at some point. In each international locations, individuals who have been extra keen to take dangers, together with attempting unfamiliar meals, have been much more likely to consume seaweed.
However the in reality fascinating variations lay in who the ones seaweed-eaters have been. In the United Kingdom, intake used to be upper amongst ethnic minorities and college graduates, and it tended to attraction extra to these at the political left.
In Japan, it used to be extra not unusual amongst girls and the ones at the political proper, reflecting its position as a standard meals fairly than another one. Accept as true with in govt, scientists or social media performed a smaller and not more constant position, and the patterns various between international locations.
In Japan, accept as true with in govt used to be related with seeing seaweed as wholesome, whilst in the United Kingdom there used to be no an identical hyperlink. Those contrasts most likely replicate how seaweed is framed in each and every nation’s media and cultural narratives.
The way in which ahead
Seaweed isn’t merely any other trendy superfood. Its doable position in sustainable meals methods is supported by means of sturdy proof.
It has a low environmental footprint, may also be cultivated at scale, and will beef up the dietary worth of different meals when used as an factor. On the other hand, our analysis presentations that making seaweed extra to be had or selling its well being advantages is not going to routinely build up its use.
In the United Kingdom, familiarity is a significant barrier. Other people can have get entry to to seaweed merchandise but nonetheless keep away from them if they don’t really feel a part of their cultural meals panorama. In Japan, the place familiarity is top, the problem lies in making sure more youthful generations stay consuming it as diets develop into extra westernised.
For international locations with little custom of consuming seaweed, our analysis suggests the best way ahead is to combine it into acquainted dishes, use transparent labelling and recipe concepts, and provide it as a ravishing and approachable choice.
Public figures, as Samuel L. Jackson has proven, can play a task in normalising it. In international locations with a powerful seaweed custom, there’s room for innovation to stay the factor related and interesting in converting diets.
Addressing world environmental demanding situations calls for greater than just right science. It calls for working out other folks’s behavior, values and motivations, and discovering tactics to paintings with them to create trade.
If seaweed is to transport from occasional novelty to a normal a part of diets in international locations the place it’s unfamiliar, the proof means that cultural connection will probably be as essential as dietary worth or environmental get advantages.
