Canada growers pitching canola oil as health food

NEW YORK (Reuters) – The Canola Council of Canada is
holding its 39th annual meeting in New York City to spur
interest in canola oil as a healthy food which can help trim
the risk of heart disease, an industry official said Thursday.

Herb Schafer, the chairman of the council and North
American vice president for Bunge Ltd., told Reuters that
canola oil is one of the healthiest vegetable oils due to its
“very low” level of saturated fats, which is a factor that can
cut the risk of heart disease.

Canola oil can become a replacement for other oils “as
people understand the importance of low-saturate products in
(their) diet,” said Schafer.

The American Medical Association has said that saturated
fats and trans fatty acids found in meat, poultry skin and hard
vegetable oils such as stick margarine “are associated with an
increase in cardiac events and should be avoided.”

Good fats which help reduce cholesterol are found in olive
oil, canola oil, peanut oil, nuts and seeds, the group said.
(http://www.ama-assn.org/ama/pub/category/11004.html)

Heart disease and stroke are the leading causes of death in
developed countries. Coronary artery disease is the leading
killer in the United States.

“A big sector of (canola) oil is in the North American
market,” said Schafer. “It is extremely important that canola
will become a premier product for the health of our
population.”