We focus on four complex health issues more prevalent in urban areas
With the Social Progress Imperative, we've developed the first neighbourhood level, health-focused social progress index of its kind.
With Wellcome Trust
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Children's health and food
We support projects that increasing children’s access to healthy, nutritious food in one or several of these places where children and families spend their time.
We have developed a model for our programme which is underpinned by three strands: homes, schools and streets. It is based on local evidence, as well as national and international learning from other urban areas.
Homes and early years settings are where most children are first exposed to different foods. These are an important space for establishing food preferences and habits, and have a long-lasting impact on a child’s health.
With this understanding, we focus on homes to impact health early in a child’s life.
Through our homes strand, we aim to support healthy food at home for all children, regardless of where they live. We focus on a few areas, including:
Schools play a key role in improving children’s health.
Primary and secondary schools have a significant impact on children’s health and weight. In the UK, they often have control over at least one meal per day for the children in their care. In our boroughs, many schools serve their pupils two meals a day – especially for children whose families are less affluent.
Schools are also often well connected in their community and have strong links with local families. As such, schools are a space with a significant opportunity to ensure all children can have healthy, nutritious meals.
Through our schools strand, we and our partners support the take-up of healthy and nutritious food options throughout the school day. Our areas of focus include:
The design and make-up of public spaces has a strong impact on what we eat.
The moment families and children step outside, they are flooded by invitations and incentives that encourage unhealthy food options. This is amplified in inner-city high streets.
We look at streets in the whole, as a narrow focus on only one element (for example, fast food outlets) is likely to only tackle part of the problem. Our work aims to reduce the availability and prominence of energy-dense food and drinks in the entire food environment.
Through our streets strand, we work with partners to change the spaces where children and families spend time outside of home and school. Our areas of focus include:
We work with local, city, national and international organisations to help urban areas become healthier places to live.
Programmes
We want to break the link between low income and poor nutrition, by improving the quality of food options in lower-income neighbourhoods.
Providing a number of unique perspectives to our children's health and food programme.