Thaindian News

New Delhi, Oct 10 (IANS) Indian parents want their children to have sharper brains as against the global parental preference of a healthy heart, a survey said Monday.

Conducted by global market research company, Ipsos, parents from 24 countries were given a list of benefits their children may receive from eating healthy foods and asked to rank the benefits.

“Twenty-four percent of Indian parents want better brain development for their kids while 20 percent chose better immunity. A healthy heart and reduced risk of disease later in life accounted for 13 percent of votes each,” said the survey.

Globally, 23 percent of the parents desired a healthy heart for their kids followed closely by reduced risk of disease later in life, better brain development and better immunity accounting for 18 percent of the votes each.

Differences in priorities were found to exist across countries as parents from China, Japan, Saudi Arabia and South Korea ranked ‘better immunity’ as being important while a healthy heart was most important for parents in Spain, Belgium, Russia, and Britain.

Reduced risk of disease was most important to parents in France, Italy, Sweden and Germany.

“Parents are influenced by their unique value systems, the availability of different foods and medicines in their countries, and the messages they receive from their local media and governments,” said Sonia Pall, CEO, Ipsos.

“Today, we see healthy options for kids in a wide range of categories, including beverages (juice boxes fortified with calcium), dairy (milk with DHA Omega-3), cereal (gluten-free options), and snacks (fruit chews containing Vitamin C),” she added.

As per Pall, innovations in children’s foods that go beyond health basics can be expected soon.

The survey was conducted between Feb 2 and June 13, 2011.

An international sample of 18,680 adults aged 16-64 were interviewed in a total of 24 countries.

“We identified 6,654 parents with children under the age of 18,” said Pall.