Lentils, kidney beans, navy beans, split peas, chickpeas…: FAO has decided to highlight this wide range of pulses by declaring « 2016 the International Year of Pulses ».
Why? Because the latter « can help fight hunger, malnutrition, and improve the sustainability of agricultural systems » explains the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) of the United Nations. No less than that! Pulses have more than one trick in their pods: they have a very interesting nutritional profile, are economically accessible and offer long shelf-life… In addition, their cultivation fosters sustainable agriculture: highly water efficient, with nitrogen fixing propertieswhich means pulses can improve soil fertility. Despite all that, the consumption of pulses is not taking off. It is even regressing in some countries. Why? What barriers need to be knocked down to give them their rightful place, to those presented today as « Super Food »?
The Louis Bonduelle Foundation invites you in the following pages to (re) discover the current role of pulses in the human diet and the obstacles that need to be overcome to support their return to grace, whose premises are already been felt.