Abstract
At both UK and global level, dietary consumption patterns need to change to address environmental, health and inequality challenges. Despite considerable policy interventions, the prevalence of overweight and obesity in the United Kingdom has continued to rise with obesity now a leading cause of mortality and morbidity. Obesity prevalence is greater among those on lower incomes and the current UK food system, including government policy, does not effectively address this. Current behavioural approaches, without the support of structural changes in the system, may even widen the inequalities gap. Hence, using behavioural insights from those living with obesity and food insecurity, the project will explore potential avenues that can be applied in the food system to promote healthier choices in the food retail environment. The National Food Strategy report recommends that the UK food system should ensure “safe, healthy, affordable food; regardless of where people live or how much they earn”. However, the association between food insecurity and the development of obesity is not well understood in relation to purchasing behaviours in the UK retail food environment, nor is the potential effectiveness of interventions that seek to prevent and reduce the impact of diet-induced health harms. The FIO Food (Food insecurity in people living with obesity – improving sustainable and healthier food choices in the retail food environment) project provides a novel and multi-disciplinary collaborative approach with co-development at the heart to address these challenges. Using four interlinked work packages, the FIO Food project will combine our knowledge of large-scale population data with an understanding of lived experiences of food shopping for people living with obesity and food insecurity, to develop solutions to support more sustainable and healthier food choices in the UK retail food environment.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 390-399 |
| Number of pages | 10 |
| Journal | Nutrition Bulletin |
| Volume | 48 |
| Issue number | 3 |
| Early online date | 17 Jul 2023 |
| DOIs | |
| Publication status | Published - Sept 2023 |
Bibliographical note
Funding Information:AMJ conceptualised the study. ML, EH, RAS, MD, MA, HG and AMJ drafted and finalised the manuscript. The authors wish to express their thanks to the team collaborators who proofread and approved the manuscript. These include: Prof. Flora Douglas (Robert Gordon University), Prof. Paul Gately, Dr Mark Gilthorpe and Dr Claire Griffiths (Leeds Beckett University), Prof. Charlotte Hardman and Dr Mark Green (University of Liverpool), Dr Michelle Morris (University of Leeds), Dr Adrian Brown (University College London) and Nilani Sritharan as a project partner, Group Healthy & Sustainable Diets Manager (Sainsbury's Supermarkets Ltd). Lastly, we would also like to acknowledge the support of all public involvement (PI) advocates and stakeholders who are supporting this project. This research is funded through the Transforming the UK Food System for Healthy People and a Healthy Environment SPF Programme, delivered by UKRI, in partnership with the Global Food Security Programme, BBSRC, ESRC, MRC, NERC, DEFRA, DHSC, OHID, Innovate UK and FSA (BB/W018020/1 – FIO Food). FIO Food
Publisher Copyright:
© 2023 The Authors. Nutrition Bulletin published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd on behalf of British Nutrition Foundation.
Data Availability Statement
Data sharing not applicable to this article as no datasets were generated or analysed during the current study.Keywords
- diet inequality
- food insecurity
- food system
- health inequality
- obesity
- sustainability
Access to Document
- Lonnie_etal_NB_Food_Insecurity_In_VOR
© 2023 The Authors. Nutrition Bulletin published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd on behalf of British Nutrition Foundation. This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.