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The plague of highly processed food items is an international crisis. Even though their consumption is especially elevated in the west, forming the majority of the average diet in nations like Britain and America, for example, UPFs are displacing fresh food in diets on all corners of the globe.

In the latest development, a comprehensive global study on the dangers to well-being of UPFs was published. It alerted that such foods are exposing millions of people to long-term harm, and urged urgent action. Earlier this year, an international child welfare organization revealed that more children around the world were overweight than malnourished for the initial instance, as junk food floods diets, with the most dramatic increases in less affluent regions.

Carlos Monteiro, a scholar in the field of nourishment science at the University of São Paulo, and one of the study's contributors, says that businesses motivated by financial gain, not consumer preferences, are driving the shift in eating patterns.

For parents, it can seem as if the whole nutritional landscape is working against them. “On occasion it feels like we have absolutely no power over what we are serving on our children's meals,” says one mother from India. We interviewed her and four other parents from around the world on the expanding hurdles and frustrations of ensuring a nutritious food regimen in the era of ultra-processing.

Nepal: ‘She Craves Cookies, Chocolate and Juice’

Bringing up a child in this South Asian country today often feels like battling an uphill struggle, especially when it comes to food. I make food at home as much as I can, but the moment my daughter goes out, she is encircled by brightly packaged snacks and sweetened beverages. She constantly craves cookies, chocolates and processed juice drinks – products heavily marketed to children. Just one pizza commercial on TV is sufficient for her to ask, “Are we getting pizza today?”

Even the educational setting encourages unhealthy habits. Her cafeteria serves sweetened fruit juice every Tuesday, which she looks forward to. She is given a packet of six cookies from a friend on the school bus and chocolates on birthdays, and encounters a french fry stand right outside her school gate.

At times it feels like the whole nutritional ecosystem is opposing parents who are merely attempting to raise well-nourished kids.

As someone associated with the a national health coalition and leading a project called Encouraging Nutritious Meals in Education, I understand this issue deeply. Yet even with my expertise, keeping my eight-year-old daughter healthy is exceptionally hard.

These ongoing experiences at school, in transit and online make it almost unfeasible for parents to curb ultra-processed foods. It is not only about the selections of the young; it is about a food system that normalises and fosters unhealthy eating.

And the figures shows clearly what parents in my situation are facing. A demographic health study found that 69% of children between six and 23 months ate unhealthy foods, and a substantial portion were already drinking flavored liquids.

These numbers resonate with what I see every day. An analysis conducted in the district where I live reported that 18.6% of schoolchildren were above a healthy size and 7.1% were obese, figures directly linked with the surge in processed food intake and more sedentary lifestyles. Additional analysis showed that many Nepali children eat sweet snacks or salty packaged items on a regular basis, and this regular consumption is tied to high levels of dental cavities.

Nepal urgently needs more robust regulations, better nutritional atmospheres in schools and more stringent promotion limits. In the meantime, families will continue waging a constant war against processed items – a single cookie pack at a time.

St Vincent and the Grenadines: ‘Greasy, Salty, Sugary Fast Food is the Preference’

My situation is a bit different as I was forced to relocate from an island in our chain of islands that was devastated by a severe cyclone last year. But it is also part of the harsh truth that is confronting parents in a region that is experiencing the very worst effects of global warming.

“The circumstances definitely becomes more severe if a cyclone or volcano activity wipes out most of your plant life.”

Before the occurrence of the storm, as a nutrition instructor, I was very worried about the growing spread of quick-service eateries. Today, even local corner stores are involved in the transformation of a country once characterized by a diet of healthy locally grown fruits and vegetables, to one where oily, salted, sweetened fast food, full of synthetic components, is the preference.

But the condition definitely deteriorates if a natural disaster or volcanic eruption wipes out most of your vegetation. Nutritious whole foods becomes scarce and very expensive, so it is really difficult to get your kids to have a proper diet.

Regardless of having a stable employment I wince at food prices now and have often turned to selecting from items such as peas and beans and protein sources when feeding my four children. Providing less food or reduced helpings have also become part of the post-disaster coping strategies.

Also it is quite convenient when you are juggling a challenging career with parenting, and hurrying about in the morning, to just give the children a couple of coins to buy snacks at school. Unfortunately, most campus food stalls only offer ultra-processed snacks and sweet fizzy drinks. The consequence of these hurdles, I fear, is an growth in the already alarming levels of lifestyle diseases such as adult-onset diabetes and hypertension.

Uganda: ‘It’s in Every Mall and Every Market’

The sign of a major fried chicken chain stands prominently at the entrance of a shopping center in a city district, challenging you to pass by without stopping at the drive-through.

Many of the kids and caregivers visiting the mall have never gone beyond the borders of the country. They certainly don’t know about the historical economic crisis that inspired the founder to start one of the first American international food chains. All they know is that the famous acronym represent all things sophisticated.

At each shopping center and every market, there is convenience meals for all budgets. As one of the more expensive options, the fried chicken chain is considered a special occasion. It is the place city residents go to observe birthdays and baptisms. It is the children’s prize when they get a favorable grades. In fact, they are hoping their parents take them there for Christmas.

“Mum, do you know that some people take takeaway for school lunch,” my 14-year-old daughter, who attends a school in the area, tells me. She says that on the days they do not pack that, they pack food from a popular east African fast-food chain selling everything from cooked morning dishes to burgers.

It is the end of the week, and I am only {half-listening|