Daily oil buyers are starting to notice the popularity of low-erucic canola oil.
Data show that rapeseed oil is the largest self-produced edible vegetable oil in our country, accounting for more than 50% of domestic vegetable oil. The large-scale production of low erucic acid rapeseed oil in our country is only the result of the past ten years, so although scientific researchers are trying their best to publicize, not many people know its benefits.
So, what are the benefits of consuming low erucic acid rapeseed oil? What are the future development prospects?
What is "Low Erucic Acid Canola Oil"?
As one of the main edible oils in our country, rapeseed oil has golden color and fragrant smell. The dishes fried with it are not only delicious, but also have high nutritional value.
However, the content of erucic acid and glucosinolates in traditional rapeseed is relatively high, of which the content of erucic acid is 20% to 60%. Since erucic acid can induce myocardial fat accumulation, congestive heart failure and other diseases, in order to protect public health, the national standard of rapeseed oil in our country stipulates that the content of erucic acid in low erucic acid rapeseed oil is not more than 3%.
According to Wang Hanzhong, an academician of the Chinese Academy of Engineering and vice president of the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, if saturated fatty acids are too high, it is easy to lead to diseases such as arteriosclerosis. In popular edible oils, low erucic acid rapeseed oil has the lowest saturated fatty acids, only 7%, which means that unsaturated fatty acids are the highest in all edible oils, reaching 93%. At the same time, the composition of unsaturated fatty acids in low erucic acid rapeseed oil is very reasonable, containing about 65% oleic acid, about 20% linoleic acid, and about 10% linolenic acid. Linoleic acid and linolenic acid are two essential fatty acids for humans and need to be ingested from the outside world.
However, most people don’t know what the health benefits of low-erucic canola oil are. Based on various information, low-erucic canola oil has four major nutrients:
The first is to have a balanced content of fatty acids. Studies have found that the lower the saturated fatty acid content, the higher the oleic acid content, and the higher the nutritional value. Low erucic acid rapeseed oil has a lower saturated fatty acid content than other edible vegetable oils, and is high in oleic acid. It is beneficial to human health and is a food source for improving dietary patterns.
Secondly, it is rich in linolenic acid. Linolenic acid is a fatty acid that is essential for the human body but cannot be synthesized by itself, and needs to be ingested from food. It is the most basic and core substance in the human body, the main component of synthetic cell membranes and biological enzymes, and plays a decisive role in human health and intelligence. It is known as the steward of human blood lipids, the scavenger of blood vessels, and the gold of the brain. In June 2014, the Chinese Nutrition Society released the 2013 version of the "Reference Intake of Dietary Nutrients (DRIs) for Chinese Residents", which increased the recommended value of alpha-linolenic acid for the first time, and stipulated that Chinese residents (pregnant women) consume 1600-1800mg of alpha-linolenic acid every day The low erucic acid rapeseed oil contains about 9% linolenic acid, which belongs to the omega-3 (α-linolenic acid) series of fatty acids.
The third is to have a high content of phenolic substances. The total amount of phenolic acids in low erucic acid rapeseed is the highest. In addition to delaying oil oxidation, it also has important functional activities such as antibacterial, anti-tumor, anti-inflammatory, and antiviral.
Moreover, it also contains a certain amount of sterols, vitamin E. These important micronutrients and functional components in the daily diet can play a positive role in reducing the incidence of cardiovascular diseases, anti-inflammation, anti-cancer, immune regulation, and improving lipid metabolism.
Over the years, researchers at home and abroad have conducted nutritional function evaluation and mechanism studies on low erucic acid rapeseed oil, confirming that it has many health benefits, such as reducing cardiovascular disease morbidity and mortality, inhibiting platelet agglutination, preventing ischemic stroke, anti-lipid peroxidation, and improving insulin sensitivity and sugar resistance.
How are the developments at home and abroad?
At present, the daily per capita consumption of edible oil in our country is about 74 grams.
However, according to the "Dietary Guidelines for Chinese Residents (2016) " issued by the Chinese Nutrition Society, the daily intake of cooking oil for adults in our country should only be 25 grams to 30 grams.
The above data shows that the current per capita consumption of vegetable oil in our country has reached more than twice the recommended amount. Medical research shows that a high-fat diet affects the metabolism of lipids and energy in the human body, so the increase in edible oil supply is closely related to the significant increase in the prevalence of chronic diseases such as hypertension, dyslipidemia, obesity and diabetes in our country.
Therefore, low erucic acid rapeseed oil entered the stage of history.
In the 1980s, our country bred the first low erucic acid rape varieties, but it was difficult to popularize and apply due to poor resistance, low yield and low oil content.
By 1990, Hubei, Sichuan, Jiangsu, Hunan, Anhui, Jiangxi, Guizhou and other major production areas had successively established joint development bodies composed of scientific research, promotion, sales, processing and other departments, creating a number of rape varieties. However, the low degree of mechanized production, poor technical integration, and low quality of the processing industry have also limited the development of the rape industry.
To this end, Academician Wang Hanzhong led the team to innovate the technical route, created a simple, rapid and reliable identification technology of sclerotinia resistance and inversion resistance, bred 10 new varieties of low erucic acid rape, and promoted more than 86 million mu cumulatively. The low erucic acid rate of rapeseed in our country increased from 28.1% in 2002 to 62.2% in 2016, and the yield per mu increased from 98.5 kg to 128.7 kg.
It can be seen that low erucic acid rapeseed oil, as a high-quality edible oil that combines health and deliciousness, has promising future prospects.
Yu Yuan
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