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WELLBEING WEEK
New strategy to promote healthy I eating in children
WELLBEING WEEK
a positive impact on the health of children. “There’s only so much a parent or guardian can do to try and make a change; kids are smart if they don’t want to eat something they won’t. “So sometimes action has to be taken.” The Food Foundation’s analysis of the National Diet and Nutrition Survey found that 80% of primary school-aged children don’t eat the recommended 3.5 portions a day. n fact, parents report that one in four children had no veg at all the previous day. The problem is even more prominent for families on a low income, who are likely to be eating on average half a portion less than those on a high income. The decades old ‘eat your greens’ approach is no longer working. According to adam&eveDDB the creators of the TV advertising campaign, the message has become outdated. “The message has become part of the problem. Vegetables are now the least exciting thing on the plate and in the supermarket and fewer kids are willing to eat them. " Too often mealtimes are battlegrounds. Coercion, bribery and threats become parents’ stock in trade to get kids to eat their veg. But this goes against a fundamental truth about kids and behaviour change. “If we were going to get kids to eat more vegetables, it was time to end the coercion and put kids in control. “We acknowledged the awkward truth about the thing we were
The government has released plans for a new healthy eating advertising strategy to target children. SOPHIE MOORE reports.
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at Them To Defeat Them’ is a radical new advertising campaign that aims to get kids eating more healthily. This new strategy is designed in response to the rise in childhood obesity and diet related diseases. According to the Food Foundation’s recent research finding 96% of teenagers and 80% of primary school age children don't eat enough vegetables. This comes after new findings reveal 1 in every 3 children in Liverpool leaving primary school overweight or living with obesity. Lucy Harrow, a children’s dietitian from the Wirral told merseynewlive that a new strategy to target children was
needed. She said: “With the Covid pandemic, childhood obesity has only continued to increase. “Obviously there are reasons for this trend, like no access to physical education or pe clubs, that’s why now more than ever there needs to be a change in the which it is handled. “I think having more advertisements which advocate healthy eating is such a good thing. For years children have had healthy eating shoved down their throats quite aggressively, but by introducing the idea in a format that kids like, will encourage them to actively want to change their diets and see the food options available to them.” Lucy added: “By showing healthy eating in a positive and entertaining way, it will only have
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trying to promote: most kids hate vegetables. “To kids, vegetables were gross. “Like Marmite, we had the chance to harness the hate and do something interesting with it. We asked ourselves ‘what if we made veg bad, not good? The governments has also released a Health and Care Bill: advertising of less healthy food. It will introduce a 9pm watershed for advertising of less healthy food or drink on TV, and a restriction on paid-for advertising of less healthy food or drink online. The bill came after obesity rates in both reception-aged and year 6 schoolchildren increased by around 4.5 percentage points between 201920 and 2020-21 which is the highest annual rise since the National Child Measurement Programme began. Jo Churchill, Public Health Minister, commented and said: “We are committed to improving the health of our children and tackling obesity. The content that youngsters see can have an impact on the choices they make and habits they form. With children spending more time online it is vital we act to protect them from unhealthy advertising.” She added: “These measures form another key part of our strategy to get the nation fitter and healthier by giving them the chance to make more informed decisions when it comes to food. “We need to take urgent action to level up health inequalities. This action on advertising will help to wipe billions off the national calorie count and give our children a fair chance of a healthy lifestyle.”
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IT’S TIME TO END THE COERCION AND PUT KIDS IN CONTROL!
Image: Unsplash Gabriel Gurrola
