Effective Policies for Healthy Food Solutions: The Role of Public-Private Partnerships for Public Health

This project is in partnership with the Canadian Obesity Network. Human diet and nutrition have changed toward a diet dominated by increased food portions; low consumption of fruits, vegetables, whole grains, cereals, and legumes; and the increase in high consumption of foods rich in saturated fat, sugars and salt. As a result, societies have witnessed a dramatic increase in obesity and chronic diseases. The agri-food system cannot be missed in the battle of reducing this complex health problem. Polices behind the food industry must be aligned with the goals of public health in terms of offering effective healthy food solutions to the population. This proposal seeks to explore potential opportunities for Public-Private Partnerships (PPPs) between the public health and the agricultural production sector as the latter plays an important role in the availability and affordability of healthy food solutions. This research has the collaboration of the Royal Agricultural Winter Fair (RAWF) and the Journey To Your Good Health Initiative (JTYGH). While this research has a great potential to directly or indirectly foster local food and farm policies for the advances in healthy food solutions to Ontarians, it also provides the tools for making the local growers more competitive to the new market of healthy living through healthy diets.

Faculty Supervisor:

Dr. Cameron Norman

Student:

Katia de Pinho Campos

Partner:

Royal Agricultural Winter Fair

Discipline:

Epidemiology / Public health and policy

Sector:

Life sciences

University:

University of Toronto