20 Mar 2015

Health the focus for American Samoa school lunch

1:05 pm on 20 March 2015

Award winning New Zealand chef, Robert Oliver, wants to help improve the health of young people in American Samoa.

Type 2 diabetes rates are at epidemic proportions in American Samoa

Type 2 diabetes rates are at epidemic proportions in American Samoa Photo: AFP

The New Zealander spent his childhood in Fiji and Samoa and has authored cook books and produced cooking shows that focus on dishes made from abundant healthy Pacific foods.

Mr Oliver is in American Samoa this week to train the school lunch programme cooks in preparing some of his island recipes with the hope that they can be incorporated into the school lunch menus.

His focus is on healthy eating.

"You know there are a lot of health problems in the Pacific and yet the answer to good health lies right in the original diet and original cuisine and the original crops and the output from the farms and the oceans. So it is just about bringing that philosophy into the school lunch."

Chef Robert Oliver.