Food Environment

Background

The Healthy Weight Healthy Wales Strategy outlines our food environment and our eating patterns have changed. Food is available 24 hours a day and we rely less on cooking from scratch or having three set meals a day. Around one in five meals are eaten outside of the home; portions are bigger and generally contain more fat, sugar and salt.

Our shops, supermarkets, takeaways and restaurants often promote and discount foods, snacks and meal deals that are energy dense and convenient rather than promote the healthier alternatives. We are constantly bombarded with advertisements and offers which encourage us to eat unhealthily. These are often targeted at children and drive our behaviours and eating patterns. All of this means that it is increasingly difficult for us to make healthier choices in our daily lives.

Creating Change

As part of the Whole System Approach to Healthy Weight across CTMUHB, the Healthy Weight Team will lead and enable system change to ensure babies, children and young people have access to good quality food.

 “Access to good quality food” was identified as an aspiration for babies, children and young people across Cwm Taf Morgannwg University Health Board, at our first stakeholder engagement event in November 2022. Further events explored how we could reach this aspiration and where power and influence was in the system in relation to the required changes.

We need to work as an entire healthy weight system to understand and shift the root causes of overweight and obesity in our populations, rather than focusing on individual behaviours we need to tackle the underlying belief systems and the underlying system structures that are driving our food culture and resulting in the behaviours which lead to overweight and obesity. Children and young people need to be heard and should be able to access food that benefits their health trajectory and needs.

Our Focus

We are working with system leads and listening to our communities to focus on moving towards positive change outlined below:

• Local shops and food projects with food offers that are affordable and of good quality
• Residents to see food advertisements in their towns and at transport links promoting good quality and affordable food
• Residents to be free from unsolicited advertisements to their homes on high, sugar, fat and salt food
• Residents and families to have access to growing spaces in their communities including schools grounds.
• Our retail environment to offer good quality, affordable food

Further Reading:

Growing Well - Cwm Taf Morgannwg University Health Board

Creating Health - Cwm Taf Morgannwg University Health Board

If you have any questions on Food Retail Offer & Food Culture in Cwm Taf Morgannwg please contact CTM.HealthyWeight@wales.nhs.uk.