Health is wealth
LCP Supplies Sdn Bhd managing director Lee Ting Ung is a firm believer in “we are what we eat”.
This keeps Lee motivated to go into the office every morning and to keep his food ingredients business running. He calls this a higher purpose, beyond just making money.
“Making money is, of course, important. But being a part of something bigger, something that helps people, gives a different level of satisfaction,” he says.
“Our primary focus is to bring a change in the quality of food produced for the market or consumers. And we take it a step further, to educate and supply to the market ingredients that could help to reduce non-communicable diseases (NCDs),” Lee adds.
He notes that more than 70% of Malaysian adults age 25 years and above suffer from NCDs such as hypertension, cardio vascular diseases, diabetes, obesity, stroke, cancer and others.
“Our society is not only unhealthy, we also have high medical cost. This will affect individuals and their family members.
“I have friends and relatives that are devastated because one or more of their family members suffer from conditions such as stroke, heart attack or diabetes, and I know how painful it is to go through the ordeal,” he shares.
From his years of experience in the industry, Lee very much believes that there are products that can improve the contents of the food and hence, improve the health of the consumers.
Some of these changes could be very simple and cost little. A simple change like changing the salt used in our kitchen can have a tremendous affect to our health, he notes.
But it is a challenge trying to convince food manufacturers and food and beverage operators to see Lee’s point of view.
“For a restaurant, when serving a plate of fried rice, the difference in the cost of using conventional salt compared to our low-sodium salt is only about eight sen. Yet they are not keen,” he says, adding that there is a slight premium for healthier ingredients.
Lee doesn’t always succeed in convincing food manufacturers to pick the healthier ingredients.
He relates another encounter with a snack food manufacturer where he tried to introduce low-sodium salt as a healthier alternative to the conventional salt. However, the manufacturer had told Lee that snack food already has an unhealthy image and spending more on a healthier ingredient would make no difference.
“It is unhealthy because the manufacturer made it unhealthy. A healthy snack food image can be created beginning with the right ingredients,” Lee insists.
There are also other items such as prebiotics and fiber that could be added by food manufacturers to improve gut health for consumers, Lee adds.
But such changes require strong market awareness to drive demand.
Lee believes everyone has a role to play in this education process, from the media and corporations to the Health Ministry. Such roles can range from public education to applying necessary legislations to ensuring that the food produced is healthy.
“We cannot do it alone. We will continue to work with food manufacturers to fast food outlets and restaurants to reduce salt and sugar in their products. Meanwhile, the players in the food industry play a pivotal role in helping to shape the health of the community,” Lee says.
Lee’s team is spending much effort in educational work including giving talks and working with pharmacists and dieticians in hospitals as well as other health-related non-governmental orgnisations to increase awareness.
He started his own brand, Fine Foods, to supply healthier alternative food ingredients to the household segment as well.
The products are designed in a way that consumers could use them the same way as they would other products.