The problem is we're not eating like we have done for thousands of years and food doesn't really resemble the food that we ate at any other time in our history. A few hundred years ago we had a much greater variety of crops and plants, so we had a much greater diversity of minerals and nutrients and it really wasn't hard to meet our micronutrient requirements without trying. Now, the variety just isn't there; if you look at most fruit and veg in a supermarket you'll find one variety, obvious exceptions being things like apples and melons.  Carrots I find particularly interesting; they used to come in a rainbow of colours, from white to yellow to purple, and each colour represents a different set of nutrients, so each colour of carrot would offer different benefits. If you ate an array of colours you'd get benefits such as protection from cancer, better communications between cells, prevention of clots, delaying of cellular ageing and some protection from the formation of tumours. Now, you get better intracellular communication. Because we've genetically altered carrots to all be orange. (Unless you can find someone who'll sell you heritage veg which is a lot more expensive.) The other issue we now have is we live in a "clean" society; we don't encourage our kids to eat dirt, we wash down everything from the toilet seat to the kitchen floor with antibacterial spray and heaven forbid we let the children near sick kids. Because of our lifestyles and fear of dirt, a lot of children aren't developing the antibodies they need and this can lead to food allergies and intolerances which is what takes up a lot of dietitians' time. Combine that with the lack of diversity in our food, the overly complicated labelling of packaged foods, misleading labelling (smoothies I'm looking at you), and the sheer power of food companies who really don't have our best interests at heart, you've got a ticking time bomb of nutritional deficiencies and over-consumption. Whether or not dietetics is a profession depends on what you think a dietitian is. If you're thinking of someone who gives out healthy eating advice like eat less salt, have a few more wholegrains and drink your milk, typical wishy-washy stuff, that's a nutritionist. That's your tumblrina who declares she's a dietitian because she took an online course and now thinks she's qualified to tell you that you've got an eating disorder. A dietitian is someone who has gone to university and studied to become a qualified medical healthcare professional. Yes they can advise on general food enquiries and help kids who aren't getting all of the nutrients they need, but they also work with patients with kidney failure, diabetes, malnutrition, IBS, and a whole host of other illnesses both in hospital with other doctors and as outpatients to ensure they can carry on their lives as normal. Dietetics is a science in itself; it is a combination of biology, chemistry, and sociology, the science of what we're eating, how we're eating it, how it's affecting us, both in the short term and long term, as individuals and a society, how our environment is shaping our relationship with food and whether or not the latest scaremongering headline about the latest food fad is factual.  Apologies for the slightly long rant, I'm having a very bad day. I'll leave you with one of my favourite quotes; "The food you eat can be either the safest and most powerful form of medicine or the slowest form of poison."