“Food Health and Safety‘‘, organised by the T.E.I. of Athens, Greece on the 11th of June 2009

Yves Boisselier from the MAC-Team network presented "An oeno-MAC approach for the French paradox". This presentation was jointly prepared by Konstantinos Sflomos (TEi of Athens and MAC-Team aisbl), Renée Payan (Université du Vin de Suze La Rousse) and Yves Boisselier (MAC-Team aisbl).

Abstract:
Important amounts of wine in the French diet correlated with lower incidence of cardio-vascular diseases (CVD) and cancers (Ca) form the basis of the “French Paradox”.
Recent studies present contradictory results pronouncing the negative effects of alcohol for the Human health.
In order to support the beneficial effects of a moderate consumption of alcoholic drinks and especially red wine, data collected from the participating institutions of the oeno-MAC project justify the needs for:

  • A thorough definition of the quality (typology/alcoholic content) and quantity of alcoholic drinks.
  • The support of synergetic effects of other functional food components, like antioxidants, saturated fats and other lipids.
  • An exact definition of the human group examined in the relevant studies.
  • The launch of studies to assess the influence of denomination specification combined with traditional or quality approaches linked to “terroir” production on the functional food components and their quality.
  • A proper information identifying and training of the wine producers and consumers (main aim of the oeno-MAC project supported in the framework of the Leonardo da Vinci European programme).