Where do Australian children get their dietary fibre? A focus on breakfast food choices

Abstract

AIMS: There is little data in Australian children assessing dietary fibre intakes or ready-to-eat cereal consumption. The aims were to: (i) assess the dietary fibre intake of 2- to 16-year-old children from the 2007 Australian National Children’s Nutrition and Physical Activity Survey; (ii) determine the percentage of children meeting adequate fibre intake; and (iii) determine the contribution of breakfast and ready-to-eat cereal fibre intake. METHODS: Secondary analysis of the 2007 Australian National Children’s Nutrition and Physical Activity Survey. RESULTS: On the day of the survey, the mean (SE) dietary fibre intake among all children at breakfast was 4.5 (0.1) g and total daily fibre intake was 20.7 (0.2) g. Fibre adequacy was achieved by 50% of Australian children. Forty-nine percent of all children consumed ready-to-eat cereal, providing 2/3 of fibre intake at breakfast and 1/10 of total daily fibre intake. Consuming ready-to-eat cereal was a significant predictor of total daily fibre intake (b = 0.028). Over 60% of all children consumed ready-to-eat cereal in which at least a ‘source’ of fibre (1.5–3.0 g) was available; however, 10% of children consumed ready-to-eat cereal containing a ‘very high source’ of fibre (_6.0 g). CONCLUSIONS: While ready-to-eat cereal was only consumed by close to half of all children, it was a significant contributor of fibre at both the breakfast meal occasion and over the whole day. Randomised controlled trials are necessary to identify whether increasing consumption of fibre from ready-to-eat cereal alters health outcomes such as anthropometric and biochemical end points.