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The Food Foundation Podcast
Maternal Diet and Obesity
This week, Melissa Hemsley, food writer, chef and sustainability champion, joins the Food Foundation podcast to look at the factors that can stop women getting healthy food when they're pregnant and when they're planning to be.
The Food Foundation's latest report Preconception, Pregnancy and Healthy Weight in Childhood shows how much a child’s health is influenced before conception, in the womb, and how a child is predisposed to obesity if their parents, especially their mother is living with obesity. We meet mums and food workers from around the country who describe what it's like to try to feed your unborn and newborn child when transport and the cost of living crisis makes access and affordability just two of the biggest deterrents to a healthy diet.
Nutritionist and one of the authors of the report, Jenny Rosborough outlines its main findings, while Jeni Meadows of the Food Justice Partnership at Lancaster City Council, Lucy Jackman of Feeding Bristol and Natasha Ricketts from the Evelyn Community Centre in Lewisham introduce us to some of the mums who need the most help.
Check out the report here which urges Government to do more to address health inequalities and improve the food environment, particularly for families and parents on a low income. Rates of overweight and obesity in pregnant women increase as the level of deprivation increases. Women living in the most deprived areas are more likely to be underweight or are living with obesity.
The report draws attention to the fact that, while Government has acknowledged the need to reduce levels of childhood obesity, more than 1 fifth of children aged four and five start school in England with overweight or obesity (22.2%). These rates are more than twice as high in children living in the most deprived areas compared to the least.
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Pod Bites: The Nestle Resolution
05:30On this week's Pod Bite, Holly Gabriel, nutritionist and campaign lead for consumer health at Share Action, tells us about the shareholder resolution that a coalition, including The Food Foundation is filing at Nestle to calls on the company to increase the amount of healthier food it sells.Click here for more on the coalition behind the initiative, and here for the Food Foundation Manifesto.40. Pod Bites: Food Justice and the Role of the City
08:32Stuart Gillespie, writer and consultant for The Food Foundation, tells us why we need cities to perform a radical overhaul of the food system to balance power and prioritise human and planetary health, rather than profit.Stuart explains how The Food Foundation, Birmingham City Council, and the Milan Urban Food Policy Pact came together in 2021 to create a global food justice pledge to encourage collaboration and collective working, empowering the voices of cities nationally and internationally.Click here for more information and here for the Food Foundation Manifesto39. Disability and Food Insecurity
20:19This week, Danny McCubbin, founder and author of The Good Kitchen reports on the Food Foundation's latest survey on the increasing food insecurity faced by people with disabilities.Food insecurity levels in the UK have reached unprecedented highs over the past few years, first in the face of the Covid-19 pandemic and now continuing through the cost of living crisis. Disabled people have been particularly exposed to food insecurity, facing stark inequalities when it comes to accessing and affording the food that they need.Shona Goudie, policy and advocacy manager at the Food Foundation, Dan White from Disabilities Rights UK, Simon Shaw, Co-Investigator, Food at Home, University of Sheffield and Sabine Goodwin from IFAN break down the stats to paint a devastating picture of life for many people living with disability in Broken Britain.Click here for the Food Foundation's Manifesto38. Pod Bites: The Lib Dems and food policy
06:46In this week's Pod Bites, Joss MacDonald, Public Affairs Lead at the Food Foundation, tells us about the Liberal Democrat Party's policies on food in the aftermath of the party's spring conference in York, Click here for the Food Foundation's manifesto.37. Pod Bites: The Youth Select Committee
06:26In this week's Pod Bite, 18 year-old, Dev Sharma, Food Foundation Young Food Ambassadors and chair of the UK Parliament Youth Select Committee on its very first inquiry into the Cost of Living crisis. The Youth Select Committee is the first youth Oarliamentary inquiry of its kind into the cost of living with the same powers as any Parliamentary Select Committee. Dev explains what happened when it presented its findings from its report on the cost of living and its impact on young people's health and well being. Click here for more on the Youth Select Committee, and here for the Food Foundation's Manifesto.36. Pod Bites: The spring Budget
06:21Hannah Brinsden, head of policy and advocacy at the Food Foundation talks about the spring budget. Assessing its commitments to support public health, low income families and also to support people through the cost of living crisis, she finds a mixed bag and a number of missed opportunities.Click here for more on the budget from Hannah and here for the Food Foundation's Manifesto.35. Pod Bites: Food Insecurity and the widening health divide
07:56In this week's Pod Bites, Shona Goudie, Policy and Advocacy Manager at the Food Foundation, digs deep into the latest statistics on food insecurity. The Food Foundation report finds that families stuck in food insecurity are buying less fruit and veg than last year as UK’s health divide widens.Click here for the Food Foundation Food Insecurity Tracker, and here for the Manifesto.34. Pod Bites: Generation Formula
06:49This week, we hear more about how families face a range of barriers to feeding their infants, whether they breastfeed or formula feed. Following the investigation into infant formula prices carried out by the The Competition and Markets Authority, Vicky Sibson, Director at First Steps Nutrition, tells us how it can influence feeding decisions. For more on The Food Foundation's report on formula prices and barriers to breastfeeding, click here. And for its Manifesto, click here33. The Barriers to Breastfeeding
26:17Guest presenter, Gemma Ogston, author of The Healing Cookbook looks at the Food Foundation's second Early Years report exploring the barriers to breastfeeding.The Food Foundation has just published this in-depth analysis revealing a flawed system in which parents face multiple barriers to provide babies with the basic nutrients needed for development before the age of two. It shows how policy failure leaves families struggling to provide babies with vital nutrients in early months of life.Hannah Brinsden, head of policy and advocacy at the Food Foundation joins Adult Food Ambassador, TJ, Dayna Brackley from Bremner and Co, Sophie Riley, midwife at Plymouth University Hospital Trust, Vicky Sibson, director of First Steps Nutrition Trust and Alison Thewliss MP to examine why we need a national breastfeeding strategy.Click here for the Food Foundation Manifesto