TY - JOUR
T1 - Assessment of evaluations made to healthy eating policies in Europe
T2 - a review within the EATWELL Project
AU - Perez Cueto Eulert, Federico Jose A
AU - Aschemann-Witzel, Jessica
AU - Shankar, Bhavani
AU - Brambila-Macias, José
AU - Bech-Larsen, Tino
AU - Mazzocchi, Mario
AU - Capacci, Sara
AU - Saba, Anna
AU - Turrini, Aida
AU - Niedzwiedzka, Barbara
AU - Piorecka, Beata
AU - Kozioł-Kozakowska, Agniezska
AU - Wills, Josephine
AU - Traill, W. Bruce
AU - Verbeke, Wim
PY - 2012
Y1 - 2012
N2 - Objective To identify and assess healthy eating policies at national level which have been evaluated in terms of their impact on awareness of healthy eating, food consumption, health outcome or cost/benefit. Design Review of policy documents and their evaluations when available. Setting European Member States. Subjects One hundred and twenty-one policy documents revised, 107 retained. Results Of the 107 selected interventions, twenty-two had been evaluated for their impact on awareness or knowledge and twenty-seven for their impact on consumption. Furthermore sixteen interventions provided an evaluation of health impact, while three actions specifically measured any cost/benefit ratio. The indicators used in these evaluations were in most cases not comparable. Evaluation was more often found for public information campaigns, regulation of meals at schools/canteens and nutrition education programmes. Conclusions The study highlights the need not only to develop harmonized and verifiable procedures but also indicators for measuring effectiveness and success and for comparing between interventions and countries. EU policies are recommended to provide a set of indicators that may be measured consistently and regularly in all countries. Furthermore, public information campaigns should be accompanied by other interventions, as evaluations may show an impact on awareness and intention, but rarely on consumption patterns and health outcome.
AB - Objective To identify and assess healthy eating policies at national level which have been evaluated in terms of their impact on awareness of healthy eating, food consumption, health outcome or cost/benefit. Design Review of policy documents and their evaluations when available. Setting European Member States. Subjects One hundred and twenty-one policy documents revised, 107 retained. Results Of the 107 selected interventions, twenty-two had been evaluated for their impact on awareness or knowledge and twenty-seven for their impact on consumption. Furthermore sixteen interventions provided an evaluation of health impact, while three actions specifically measured any cost/benefit ratio. The indicators used in these evaluations were in most cases not comparable. Evaluation was more often found for public information campaigns, regulation of meals at schools/canteens and nutrition education programmes. Conclusions The study highlights the need not only to develop harmonized and verifiable procedures but also indicators for measuring effectiveness and success and for comparing between interventions and countries. EU policies are recommended to provide a set of indicators that may be measured consistently and regularly in all countries. Furthermore, public information campaigns should be accompanied by other interventions, as evaluations may show an impact on awareness and intention, but rarely on consumption patterns and health outcome.
KW - EATWELL Project
KW - Europe
KW - Food and nutrition policy
KW - Healthy eating
U2 - 10.1017/S1368980011003107
DO - 10.1017/S1368980011003107
M3 - Journal article
C2 - 22123203
AN - SCOPUS:84864056412
SN - 1368-9800
VL - 15
SP - 1489
EP - 1496
JO - Public Health Nutrition
JF - Public Health Nutrition
IS - 8
ER -