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Under the High Patronage of the Hungarian Presidency of the European Union, the FOOD conference was hosted in the European Parliament premises in Brussels on May 31st, 2011. The Conference launched the transition from the co-funded project of balanced nutrition to a programme adaptable in other Member States.

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Why is it essential to encourage healthy eating habits towards employees during their lunch break? How helping employees in their everyday choices? Which messages and which tools are they expecting? What are the restaurants doing to answer this growing demand about healthy eating?

Experts in the field of nutrition and public health will gather on May 31st, 2011 at the FOOD Conference in order to bring answers to these questions. They will present their initiatives and views on this innovative project which enabled to develop and test concrete solutions for the promotion of balanced nutrition in six European Member states. More than a best practices exchange, a broad dissemination will be launched in other countries with a programme adaptable to local specificities.

The 25 public and private partners as well as high-level European political participants will enrich the discussions with testimonies about their own experience and will to act.

May 31st, 2011 at the European Parliament, the FOOD Conference proposes to exceed the theory and seize the keys to act.

The FOOD project

In the framework of the Second Programme of Community action in the field of Health, a public-private consortium, gathering representatives of Public Health Authorities, nutritionists and Universities, developed the FOOD project (Fighting Obesity through Offer and Demand), co-funded by DG SANCO, and headed by Edenred. It concentrates on health promotion in the workplace.

A unique and innovative communication canal between employees and restaurants staff has been built thanks to the Meal Voucher network, in order to promote balanced nutrition. It is known that employees set aside good nutrition precepts when they are working. A lack of time, information and knowledge result in bad habits and lead to negative effects on health the overall wellbeing.

2 objectives:

Sensitise employees in order to help them to improve their nutrition habits

Improve the nutritional quality of the food offer by working with restaurants

The FOOD methodology: 5 successive and mutually-reinforcing stages to meet these objectives:

1. Inventory of the existing programmes and 2 types of surveys

2. Comparative analysis of the results and specific recommendations of the partners

3. Pilots in restaurants and companies: development of simple tools adapted to each target

4. Evaluation of the pilots

5. New tools created and dissemination of best practices in Europe and beyond

Pleasure, lunch break and restaurant are easily compatible when having the keys to understand and to act. The European programme FOOD promotes health at the workplace with ready to use-adapted-free tools.