Mangaluru: A healthy lifestyle can be achieved by consuming a variety of dishes prepared from millets. Besides being beneficial for good health, millet crops also support agriculture, help maintain soil health, and contribute to environmental conservation, said Jayaram, project director of the Dakshina Kannada zilla panchayat.He was speaking after inaugurating the district-level millet and traditional (forgotten) foods cooking competition held at the office of the joint director of agriculture on Wednesday. He said that millets can be used to prepare a wide range of dishes and are highly beneficial for health. Cultivating millets not only helps conserve water, but is also advantageous for humans, livestock, and environmental protection, he said. Stressing the need to increase the consumption of millets, Jayaram urged people to replace junk food with millets in their daily diet for a healthier life. Joint director of agriculture Honnappa Govinda Gowda said there is a need to introduce the food practices of earlier generations to today’s youth. With this objective, many such programmes will be organised in the future, he said. A total of 51 participants from various taluks of the district took part in the competition. Among them, 10 participants competed in the forgotten foods category, 17 in the savoury millet dishes category, and 24 in the sweet millet dishes category. The participants showcased a wide variety of dishes such as kaje laddu, patrode, naanil ( a traditional Tulu dish), ollede kodi, therede kodi, various greens’ chutneys, ragi laddu, jowar roti, navane upma, navane bisibelebath, cake made from jowar flour, jackfruit biryani, jackfruit holige, millet cookies, ragi halwa, and millet pongay. In the savoury millet dishes category, Jayashree Attavar won the first prize, Rajeshwari N won second, and MP Rohini Acharya secured third place. In the sweet millet dishes category, Vimala Raju won the first prize, Vivek Alva won second, and Prajwal M won third place. In the forgotten foods category, Shashmi Bhat won the first prize, followed by Smita Vivek and Sunita Harish.