Sustainable and Healthy Diets:
the policy problem
Corinna Hawkes & Tim Lang
c.hawkes@wcrf.org; t.lang@city.ac.uk
Talk to Wellcome seminar, London, April 22-23 2-14
Context
2
Policy problem raised by sustainable
diets is one of competing analyses
The food system is fine
• Right economics
• Wrong consumers
• Wrong mindsets
• Wrong bodies
Solutions:
• Change behaviour
• Personalisation
• Some tech fixes to
increase resource
efficiency / for specific
food products
Food system is in crisis
• Physiology is fixed
• Wrong environment
• Wrong €$£ signals
• Distorted culture
Solutions:
• Multiple complex acts
• Population-level food policy
• Reframe conditions
3
Northern EU Govts began to engage, 2006 ff
UK 2006
Sustainable Development Commission
(SDC) & National Consumer Council
Sustainable Consumption “I will if you
will” – generic advice
Germany
2008 -
German Council for Sustainable
Development
Sustainable Shopping Basket:
includes food – lists labels and
schemes (3rd ed)
Netherlands
2009
LNV Ministry – Policy outline for achieving
Sustainable Food
Sustainable food production &
consumer educ. campaigns
Sweden
2009
National Food Administration (& Swedish
EPA) – notification to EU (withdrawn 2011)
Environmentally friendly food choices
UK 2008-10
SDC, Cabinet Office, Council of Food Policy
Advisors, & Defra
Recognition of need for new direction.
Food 2030 makes sustainable
healthy diet one of 6 goals
Netherlands
2011
Health Council for Ministry Economic Affairs,
Agriculture & Innovation
Guidelines Healthy Diet: Ecological
Perspective
France 2011
INRA Agrimonde study
Security focus but flags consumer
change
UK 2012-13
Defra Green Food Project
Outlines Principles for Sustainable
Consumption
4
EU: supply focus on resource efficiency
1. UN Sustainable Consumption and Production
– Marrakech process (post Rio 1992  Johannesburg 2002 CSD)
http://esa.un.org/marrakechprocess/index.shtml
– Focus on products / LifeCycleAnalysis (LCA) / Sustainable lifestyles
2. CAP slowly changing (situation normal)
– Shift from paying for production to environmental goods
– Climate change adaptation SEC(2009) 417: http://ec.europa.eu/agriculture/sfs/index_en.htm
3. EU Platform for Action on Diet, PA & Health (parallel to SCP)
– focus on NCDs / Consumer information/ But weak so far on Sust’l
Consumption in food; Food Information regulation (2011) / focus on
ingredients not impact / years arguing Nutrition labels
4. Commercial focus on products not health:
– Integrated Product Policy (IPP) focus on enviro’t eg waste
– http://ec.europa.eu/environment/ipp/integratedpp.htm
– Focus on Carbon and Waste reduction as efficiency
5. Sustainable Food Consultation 2013 & Communiqué 2014:
- the focus narrows (??? under pressure???)
5
Food Co.s: product focus + choice-edit?
• International companies:
–
–
–
–
2009: G30 top TNCs initiative Coca-Cola, Tesco, Unilever
2002: SAI launched Groupe Danone, Nestlé, Unilever
2010: World Economic Forum process (published 2011)
2010: Barilla Centre’s double inverted pyramid
• UK companies:
– 2007: IGD Food Industry Sustainability Strategy Champions
Group focus on low carbon + ethics
– 3 retailers’ choice-edit M&S Plan A, Co-operative Group, Waitrose
– Unilever, PepsiCo brand sustainability strategies
– WRAP/BRC complex metric study 2013
• VERDICT: product-specific approach not overall diet
6
The elephant in the room: consumers
• Policy attention is weak on consumers
• Need to reduce consumption....not just switch it
– “we can lower CO2 up to a point but in 10 years consumers will
have to change” (global retailer)
• Consumer change raises tricky policy problems:
–
–
–
–
Rich/poor (within LDCs and LDCs/rich societies)
Few eat ideal healthy diet, let alone sustainable diet
Price issues: are sustainable diets more expensive?
Choice culture - assumption that consumers lead
• So far, there aren’t even weak policies
– UN (FAO=WHO) refusal to include Sust Diet Guidelines for ICN2
– No EU sustainability food label (expressly taken out of enviro
labels: white goods, yes; food, no)
– No UK follow-up (yet) to Food 2030 or Green Food Project
Principles
7
Food policy and behaviour
change
8
Policy problem raised by sustainable
diets is one of competing analyses
The food system is fine
• Right economics
• Wrong consumers
• Wrong mindsets
• Wrong bodies
Solutions:
• Individual behaviour
change
• Personalisation
• Some tech fixes to
specific food products
Food system is in crisis
• Physiology is fixed
• Wrong environment
• Wrong €$£ signals
• Distorted culture
Solutions:
• Multiple complex acts
• Population-level food
policy
• Reframe conditions
9
Approach of public health-oriented
food policy advocates
• We all want individuals to eat diets consistent with healthy weights
& good health
• Consumer behaviour driven by
– food environment
– globalisation of food systems
– Big Food
• We need to “protect” people – especially kids, from onslaught
• We need behaviour change for the food industry - there is evidence
for comprehensive marketing restrictions, warning labels, taxes,
school food restrictions
• Individual-level approaches do not work
• Behaviour change approaches are for wimps
10
Policy solution raised by healthy, sustainable
diets is one of complementary analyses
The “consumer” is part of the food system
• Right Wrong economics
• Wrong consumersConsumer behaviour shapes the food
system but is also shaped by it
• Wrong Environment is all about choice
• Wrong €$£ signals both wrong and right
Solutions –
1. Population-level food policy which aims to change (or
maintain) behaviour among individuals
2. Understanding both food system behaviour and why
consumers behave as they do
3. Interdisciplinary reframing
11
1. FOOD POLICY FRAMEWORK FOR HEALTHY DIETS
NOURISHING FRAMEWORK – POLICY ACTIONS FOR
BEHAVIOUR CHANGE AT MULTIPLE LEVELS
The evidence
14
The evidence problem
1.
2.
There is plenty of evidence….
• of the “problem”
• that behaviour change is possible
• to design effective policy solutions
But there are barriers to effective design,
implementation and evaluation
• Economics – cost; viability
• Politics – “nanny state”; food industry
• Governance – multisectoral action
• “Medical” approach to evaluation - shorttermism; metrics of success unclear
• Perceived lack of evidence of effectiveness
• Very high bar set for evidence
Where is the
demonstrable
evidence of
effects?
2. An interdisciplinary approach to linking food
system behaviour with consumer behaviour
A preference lens –
there are genetic
preferences but we
we learn most of
preferences & habits
from our
environment,
culture, choice
architecture etc
Implications
for how
policy works
16
17
Interdisciplinary reframing
Discipline/framework
Policy solution
Classical economics
Information
plus behavioural
psychology
“Nudge”
plus public health
Smarter health-oriented food policy – understands
preferences as endogenous / “culture”; targeting
populations based on understanding of individual
behaviour; a long-term view; food systems
amplification & interventions
plus environmental
science
Smarter food policy – as above and joining up
healthy & sustainable diets
18
Public policy must lead: the case for
Sustainable Dietary Guidelines
• Provide a rational basis to the general food policy framework
which is good for public and supply
• Bridge the gap between NCD and CO2e discourses
• Provide C21st basis for public advice + supply chain
• Shift policy debate from productionist approach
• Recalibrate institutions around consumer needs
• This is supposed to be a consumer society but consumers are not
being helped
19
Our key points
Many problems
• Yawning gap between evidence and practice
• Policy attention is (s)low; it rose 2007-08, then fell
• Attention segmented by disciplinary foci
• Consumers seen as “separate” to food and social systems
• “Behaviour change” seen as “personal” not “policy”
• Fear among politicians of placing ‘choice culture’ within health &
environmental frameworks; consumers = voters
What we need
• Coherence & integration between disciplines/sectors/depts (& incentives)
• Population-approach to healthy sustainable diets based on understanding of
consumer behaviour and how policy works
• Behaviour change at multiple levels & actors for health & sustainability
• A long term view with clear shorter-term metrics to measure “what works”
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THANK YOU
For further information contact:
Dr Corinna Hawkes
Head of Policy and Public Affairs, WCRF International
policy@wcrf.org and c.hawkes@wcrf.org
@wcrfint @corinnahawkes
facebook.com/wcrfint
www.wcrf.org/policy_public_affairs
youtube.com/wcrfint
wcrf.org/blog