This study aimed to evaluate dietary behaviors and food allergy status of preschool children in Gwangsan-gu, Gwangju Metropolitan city. The survey included 592 preschool children aged 1-5 years old in 31 childcare facilities. General characteristics, feeding type, complementary feeding, food allergy, dietary behaviors based on the NQ-P questionnaire, and dietary habits of their family were considered. Exclusively breast-fed children was 32.2% of the subjects and the breast feeding duration was 6.5 months. Subjects who had complementary feeding within 6 months was 77.2% and starting time of complementary feeding was 6.1 months. Fifteen percent of the subjects had food allergies and foods that induced allergy were instant foods, eggs, milk and dairy products, nuts, seafood. Food allergy was not related to breast feeding nor complementary feeding. The NQ-P score and its 3 factors including ‘balance’, ‘moderation’, and ‘environment’ were 59.9, 61.1, 56.0, 62.6, respectively. There were positive relations between children’s dietary behaviors and family dietary habits such as breakfast eating frequency and meal regularity. As age of children increased, instant food intake increased and breakfast eating frequency decreased. Proper nutrition education is needed to children, their parents, and their care givers at childcare facilities to improve children’s dietary behavior and health.

Food allergy is a chronic disease that is increasing all over the world, and it can even lead to a loss of life. To prevent any incidents resulting from food allergies, most countries keep strengthening their food allergen labeling requirements domestically and internationally, with a constant monitoring system against undeclared allergens and recall of offending products. In order to avoid economic losses to industry and damages to international relations from undeclared allergens, it is necessary to confirm each country’s regulatory policy on food allergen labeling prior to exportation. Another required action is to try for a reduction of the cross-contamination risk of the allergens during manufacturing and storage, which should be verified by using an accurate and reliable analysis of food allergens. This paper is intended to provide an introduction to the regulation of food allergen labeling by country, allergen management methods to avoid cross-contamination, and allergen detection methods using ELISA, PCR, and LC/ MS. Changes of allergenicity during thermal or nonthermal processing also will be investigated in our review. This review will be helpful for the food industry to better understand patients suffering from food allergies and to manage food allergens in food manufacturing.

본 연구의 목적은 경남지역의 제과제빵 종사자들의 식품 알레르기에 대한 인식수준을 조사하고 이것을 바탕으 로 식품 알레르기 인식 개선 및 관리방안을 모색하는데 있다. 경남지역의 제과협회에 등록된 업체 대표자 및 종사자를 대상으로 조사를 실시하였으며 설문지는 식품 알 레르기와 제과제빵의 연관성, 개발 시 식품 알레르기 고려 여부, 식품 알레르겐 다량 함유 여부, 유발 원인 및 알 레르기 증상에 대한 차이를 확인하기 위해 작성 되었다. 102개 업체에 설문지를 배포하였고 그 중 67.7%(69개/102 개) 업체로부터 설문지가 회수 되어 통계 분석에 사용하 였고 수집 된 69개의 설문결과에 따르면 식품 알레르기에 대하여 알거나 들은 경험이 있는 제과제빵 종사자는 87%(60 명/69명)으로 대부분 경험이 있는 것으로 나타났으며, 일 부 13%(9명/69명)의 종사자가 경험이 없다고 답하였다. 그 러나 제조과정 중 식품 알레르기를 ‘고려한다’ 73.9%(51 명/69명) 수준으로 응답했지만 식품 알레르겐과 식품 알 레르기 증상을 관리하는 방법에 대해서 대부분 알지못했 다. 제과제빵 종사자들을 위한 식품 알레르기교육 참가 여 부에 대해 ‘매우 그렇다’ 30.4%(21명/69명), ‘그렇다’ 40.6%

The purpose of this study was to investigate perception of the Food Allergy Labeling System (FALS) of school foodservice in female middle school students. The subjects were 148 female middle school students in the Incheon metropolitan area. In this cross-sectional study, data were collected using self-administered questionnaires. Only 20.9% of subjects had experience of food allergy education. There was no significant difference in food allergy knowledge by grade. The scores of perception of food allergy labeling by school foodservice were significantly higher in lower grade students (p<0.001). In all grades, highest scores were observed for ‘food allergy labeling is necessary’, whereas the lowest scores were for ‘I check the food allergy labeling’. The percentages of subjects who wanted to participate in food allergy education were significantly different (p<0.01); 73.8% in 1st grade, 50.0% in 2nd grade, and 35.7% in 3rd grade. For desired education contents to enhance perception of FALS, 57.5% of subjects answered ‘emergency management’ and 23.0% said ‘information of food allergy causing food’. Therefore, it is necessary to increase food allergy education and educate female middle school students according to grade in order to enhance perception of FALS.

Food allergy refers to an immunologically mediated adverse reaction to food, mainly to proteinaceous constituents. Health implications vary between those individuals who experience mild physical discomforts to those with fast-acting, life-threatening anaphylactic reactions. The prevalence of food allergy is higher in children than in adults, estimated around 4-8% and 1-2% respectively in developed countries. Food allergy has no effective cure at the present time and total avoidance of causative foods is the most reliable prophylactic method currently recommended by the medical community. To help food allergic patients to make informed choices of their foods, mandatory labeling of selected food allergens has been introduced in several countries. All food allergen labelling provisions specify a set of allergens common to the regulated countries. Policy divergence, however, exists between countries by inclusion of additional allergens unique to specific countries and enforcement of specific labelling requirements. Such variations in food allergen labelling regulations make it difficult to manage allergen labeling in imported pre-packaged food products. This paper addresses two current issues in food allergen regulation: 1) an urgent need to determine true prevalence of food allergy in the Asia-Pacific region. This will enable refinement to the food allergen regulation to be more country-specific rather than simply adopting CODEX recommendations. 2) There is an urgent need for harmonization of food allergen regulation in order to prevent food allergen regulation becoming a trade barrier.