Korean people frequently say “it’s good for health” more than “it’s delicious” when they offer food. It is evident that they place more emphasis on its nutrition than its taste. The type of food I had when first visited Korea for a backpacking trip about twenty years ago was the ‘Samgyetang (chicken soup with ginseng)’ known as a typical health food. Like the phrase ‘Fight fire with fire’ means, Korean culture where its people enjoy eating hot food to overcome the ‘Sambok(hottest days in summer)’ seems very unique and fascinating

In the West including my home country France known as the ‘Country of Gourmets’, ‘taste, visual style, quality of service’ are major criteria for food evaluation. But, in order to properly evaluate unique food culture of Korea, there needs to be a new criterion such as ‘nutritional value, variety, culture of sharing'. Although living abroad away from my home country for long time, I have almost never seen a table full of dishes made with various ingredients, and also it is quite rare to see the scene of offering and sharing food like in Korea.

Like the saying ‘Food is medicine’, Korean food has a relatively strong ‘functional’ characteristics. It is quite late for the Korean table, set with rice and soup as a base and arrayed with even nutrition through various dishes for every meal, to be recognized internationally as a new healthy diet recently. In the healthcare field, beyond treatment of diseases, preventive medicine and self-care are becoming keywords, and we may say that Korean food culture is the originator of this trend.

On the other hand, due to the increasing number of people supplementing additional nutrition deficient from food taken in busy and irregular life and investing on aging management, the health functional food market in Korea is growing rapidly. Reflecting this trend, the health functional food brand, ‘Cenovis’, was launched from my company two years ago.

And I believe that along with its quantitative expansion, it is necessary to extend the channel of product distribution and client accessibility, and raise transparency of information delivery for the rights of Korean consumers who highly value health. This may prevent the value of health being excessively commercialized and hidden, and may assist the health functional food market in Korea to lead ‘scientific self-care’ trend. And the consumer consciousness determining to make a wise purchase decision after the close review on nutrition ingredients and content of products is also very important.

On the forthcoming ‘Malbok(last hottest day in summer), I expect to see unusual scenes of a long line of people in front of the restaurants selling ‘Samgyetang(chicken soup with ginseng) across the country. Reminding myself of the goal, ‘steady exercise and management of weight’, set in the early days of this year, I am planning to join the line for the soup. There is nothing better than being with people who make us happy, and enjoying tasty food and talk for good health. (Hankook Eco)