A healthy eating and lifestyle program developed by Surfing Scientist Ruben Meerman to potentially be delivered at local schools has been supported by Bundaberg Regional Council.
The Eat Breathe Live program focuses on nutrition, metabolism and losing weight through breath.
Bundaberg local Ruben is the brains behind the initiative, teaching students about how to make conscious choices about the food they eat to help reduce weight and live a healthy lifestyle.
The objective of Ruben’s work is to improve health outcomes and reduce obesity rates by improving knowledge of science and health literacy.
“We are going to teach Bundaberg primary school children that food comes back out of your body as carbon dioxide, which has never been done anywhere in the world,” he said.
“The big question is what impact is that going to have on them in the long term?
“In the short term they are going to love learning about it because it fascinates them, and in the long term it will increase their understanding of nutrition and maintaining a healthy weight and a healthy lifestyle.
“It might also, I suspect, increase the participation in STEM subjects going from grade 10 to grade 11 and 12 – fingers crossed as that’s all part of the experiment!”
Ruben is a proud Bundaberg local and said there was no better place for him to spread his Eat, Breathe, Live message.
“It’s so exciting and there are so many good little spin offs that will happen here – it’s not just the school kids I want to teach, it’s their parents and grandparents and everyone,” he said.
At last week's meeting, Bundaberg Regional Council voted to support the project and its rollout to local schools with a funding commitment of $30,000.
The funds are contingent upon securing equal or greater State, Federal or other funding.
Eat Breathe Live promotes healthy lifestyles
Mayor Jack Dempsey said Ruben's work and research aligned with Bundaberg Regional Council's coordinated approach to promoting healthy lifestyles.
“This wonderful initiative from our very own Surfing Scientist falls in line with Council's Building a Healthy Bundaberg Alliance which is made up of more than 30 local health and wellbeing organisations working towards a goal of making our region healthier and happier,” he said.
“We live in iconic Queensland and there’s no better location than the Bundaberg Region to take advantage of a healthier lifestyle while learning more about what we put into our bodies.
“It’s fantastic to see other people within our community, like Ruben, providing education in how we can further take charge of our health to live a more positive life.”
Ruben said he was thrilled to have the support of Bundaberg Regional Council for his Eat Breathe Live project.
“The funding is the launchpad for this, it is going to take a couple of years, but it’s invaluable and the spark that it needs to set the blaze going,” he said.
“I am really proud of being able to do this in my hometown.”
