A Nutrition Report Card on food environments for children and youth: 5 years of experience from Canada

Abstract

Objective:In 2014, a Nutrition Report Card (NRC) was developed as a sustainable, low-cost framework to assess the healthfulness of children’s food environments and highlight action to support healthy eating. We summarise our experiences in producing, disseminating, evaluating and refining an annual NRC in a Canadian province from 2015 to 2019.Design:To produce the NRC, children’s food environment indicator data are collected, analyzed and compiled for consensus grading by an Expert Working Group of researchers and practitioners. Knowledge translation activities are tailored annually to the needs of target audiences: researchers, practitioners, policymakers and the public. Evaluation of reach is conducted through diverse strategies, including tracking media coverage and website traffic. Assessment of impact on diets and health outcomes is planned.Setting:Alberta, Canada.Participants:Not applicable.Discussion:The grading process has facilitated refining the NRC to enhance its relevance and utility as a tool for its target audiences. Its public release consistently captures media interest and policymakers’ attention. The importance of partnerships in revealing data sources and in strategising to enhance policy approaches to improve food environments is apparent. The NRC has benchmarked progress and stimulated dialogue regarding healthy food environments for children.Conclusions:The NRC may help to foster a supportive climate for improving the quality of children’s food environments. As an engaging and accessible document, the NRC represents a key mechanism for collating data related to children’s food environments and ensuring it reaches the audiences best positioned to use it. Efforts are underway to expand the NRC across Canada.

Local Environment Action on Food project: impact of a community-based food environment intervention in Canada

“…Further, participants provided insight into the perceived barriers and facilitators that contribute to sustainable local food environment action. This study’s findings are supported by and build on our team’s experiences with the provincial NRC ( Ferdinands et al , 2020 ).…”

“…LEAF is an ongoing community-based health promotion intervention implemented in 17 communities across Alberta, Canada, beginning in 2017. LEAF is one component of a multi-pronged research project, under the umbrella of an annual assessment of the province’s food environments and nutrition policies, Alberta’s Nutrition Report Card on Food Evironments for Children & Youth (provincial NRC), which assesses the status of five food environments ( Brennan et al , 2011 ): the physical (what food is available), communication (food and nutrition messages), economic (food affordability), social (norms and values about food) and political (rules and policies) environments [see Olstad et al ( Olstad et al , 2014 ) for details, and Ferdinands et al ( Ferdinands et al , 2020 ) for progress since its implementation in 2015]. Engaging local communities represented a supplemental opportunity to improve provincial food environments.…”

Citizen science in monitoring food environments: a qualitative collective case study of stakeholders’ experiences during the Local Environment Action on Food project in Alberta, Canada

“…These strategies provide insight into the complexities and challenges of building community relationships while conducting citizen science research, which are best demonstrated through a closer examination of the category treading lightly. Based on our experiences with the provincial NRC [ 18 ], we expected that communities might have some concerns with assigning grades to community settings. However, we did not anticipate that these concerns would lead communities to alter the LEAF process.…”

“…Although each “community” in this study was a municipality of varying size (see Table 1 ), we refer to LEAF as a community-based intervention because it could be implemented to align with other definitions of community. Part of a broader provincial strategy, which includes the Alberta Nutrition Report Card on Food Environments for Children and Youth (provincial NRC) [ 18 ], LEAF employs a “by the people” citizen science approach [ 12 ] to engage residents in monitoring and acting on local food environments and nutrition policies relevant to children and youth. Following Brennan et al [ 19 ], LEAF evaluates five food environments: the physical, communication, economic, social, and political environments.…”

Contextually Appropriate Tools and Solutions to Facilitate Healthy Eating Identified by People with Type 2 Diabetes

“…In Canada, research on how food environments shape the availability, affordability, and social acceptance of food and nutrition choices is growing. Nutrition report cards have been developed to assess the healthfulness of children’s food environments [ 46 ] and could be applied to key environments for people with T2D to support healthy eating in this population.…”