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Study Finds UK Fruit and Vegetables Up to 50% Less Nutritious Than in the 1960s

Researchers at Deep Science Ventures say UK fruit and vegetables have lost up to half their nutritional value since the 1960s. The findings could put the country's five-a-day guidance, introduced in 2003, in question.

AI News Feed · 2026-10-11 11:39

The study found that people would now have to eat twice as many vegetables to obtain the same levels of minerals such as potassium, magnesium or copper that were present in food 60 years ago. Across many crops, between 20% and 50% of several key nutrients have been lost, the researchers found.

The decline is attributed to worsening soil quality and to crops being selectively bred for how quickly they grow rather than for their health benefits, according to the report. The result, the study says, is food that looks much the same as it did in the Sixties but delivers less of what the body needs from it.

The findings raise the prospect that the advice to eat five portions of fruit and vegetables a day, introduced in the UK in 2003, may need to be updated. The recommendation has been a central part of public health messaging on diet for more than two decades.

The report added that people taking weight-loss drugs could be most at risk from the nutrient shortfall, since those treatments can lead them to consume less food overall and therefore take in fewer minerals and vitamins.

Researchers pointed to nature-friendly farming techniques as one option for improving the health value of vegetables, including planting crops that restore nutrients to the soil. The study did not set out how quickly such changes could reverse the losses measured since the 1960s.

Will Summers, a senior associate at the firm, said the food industry had "been quietly hollowing out what's inside our food." The study's figures cover UK produce and were drawn together by researchers at the venture studio, which works with early-stage science companies.

The five-a-day target was launched by the UK government in 2003 as a guide to minimum daily consumption of fruit and vegetables. The new nutrient figures suggest the same number of portions may now deliver less than it did when that guidance was written.