Will eating carrots improve your eyesight?
Carrots are a root vegetable high in nutritious with an added crunch. It is carrot season right now and for one of our farmers, Mother Tri, this means a lot of hard work as she and her whole family are harvesting their flavorful carrots for us to enjoy.
The family is etnic Churu people and live in the Central Highland from where they run their family farm. They depend on the income they can get from their crop.
So, will Mother Tri’s carrots help us improve our vision? Growing up many of us have heard one or another version of “eat carrots it is good for your eyes”, let’s have a look into what science tells us.
It is a ‘yes and no’ answer really and simply put, it really comes down to one vitamin – vitamin A. For people who lack vitamin A, eating more may impact their vision, hence eating vitamin A could improve their vision to a “normal” level. Said in other words, if you are where you need to be with your vitamin A intake not much is going to change for your vision eating carrots or not.
Vitamin A can be found in many other products such as milk, cheese, egg yolk and liver, being a vegetarian or vegan that may create an issue, so you might want to consider eating Mother Tri’s carrots.
Antioxidants are known to prevent eye damage caused by free radicals. It just so happens that orange carrots in particular are very rich in beta carotene as well as lutein also known as antioxidants. Consider eating cooked rather than raw carrots as your body will absorb and utilize the beta carotene better. Beta carotene is what will convert into vitamin A, hence would be beneficial to your eyes.
Other than benefitting from the vitamin A in carrots, there are a whole range of other benefits like biotin, vitamins K1 and B6 and not least potassium. There really are no reasons why you would not want to indulge in a delicious crunchy carrot from Mother Tri’s family farm.
Fun facts about carrots:
- Via historical documents and paintings carrots can be traced back about 5.000 years!
- Number of carrots one ordinary person will consume in a lifetime – 10.866
- In the 17th century when carrots first appeared in The Netherlands they were grown in orange color to honor The House of Orange (The Royal Family)
- Approximately 45% of all carrots today are grown in China.
- Carrots are made up of approximately 88% of water.
- There are more than 100 different kinds of carrots.
- Wild rabbits do not eat wild carrots.
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