National Food Strategy issues urgent call to action

In a press briefing before the report was published, Dimbleby told Food Manufacture​ that food and drink processors “could do more” ​to back the responsible marketing and reformulation of food. The industry’s negative external impacts on areas such as the environment, as well as health, also needed addressing, he said.

The report comes just days after the Government published plans to tackle obesity​​ in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic.  

Part one of the National Food Strategy, led by British entrepreneur Dimbleby and published today (Wednesday, 29 July)​​ is the first independent review of the UK’s food policy in nearly 75 years. The strategy, commissioned by the Government in 2019, aims to ensure a food system that is healthy, affordable, sustainable, resilient and productive.

The report has accused the food industry of “clothing itself and its products in false virtue”.​ It has criticised the promotion of high-fat, -sugar and -salt (HFSS) products – including “unhealthy multi-buy offers”​, and the strategic placement of products near checkouts. It has supported restricting advertising and welcomed the Government’s ambition to introduce a 9pm watershed for unhealthy products on television and online.

Dimbleby said: “​Unless action is taken to improve our food system, many thousands will continue to suffer. This does not have to be the case.​

“I welcome the Government’s action to tackle obesity, yet more must be done. Most urgently, we must ensure that our most disadvantaged children – who are already at risk of being left behind by this crisis can access healthy food. The very foundation of equality of opportunity has to be a nutritious diet.​

“Although the recommendations in this report are merely a first step, I urge the Government to implement them quickly. In doing so, it will improve the health of the nation and be a necessary pillar of its ambition to level up society.”​

Dimbleby has made two major proposals in the report. He urged the UK to provide a “nutritional safety net​” for children in poor households and to grasp a rare opportunity to decide its character as a trading nation post-Brexit.

Second World War​ 

The report stated that the food system had just endured its biggest stress test since the Second World War with the coronavirus pandemic. 

“As COVID-19 swept through the UK, the entire machinery of supply and distribution had to be recalibrated, fast. The fact that, after a wobbly start, there were no serious food shortages is a testament to the flexibility and entrepreneurialism of so many food businesses, and the resilience of the system as a whole,” ​it asserts.

“There have, however, been heavy losses. Workers in the food production and retail sectors have suffered some of the highest death rates from COVID-19. Those in the hospitality sector have taken the biggest economic hit, with a higher proportion of furloughed staff (and expected redundancies) than any other profession. Across the wider population, the wave of unemployment now rushing towards us is likely to create a sharp rise in food insecurity and outright hunger.”​ ​

‘Terrible clarity’​

The strategy document stated that the virus had shown, with “terrible clarity”,​the damage being done to people’s health by the modern food system. Children were at risk of getting “left behind​” unless “immediate action”​ is taken to improve the British diet, it claimed.

Dimbleby has called for the expansion of free school meals to every child from a household on Universal Credit and the expansion of Holiday Activity and Food Programmes to all areas in England.

The report has also proposed an increase in the value of Healthy Start vouchers to £4.25 per week, and where the parent or guardian is in receipt of Universal Credit. Dimbleby further proposed expanding the scheme to pregnant women and households with children under four years old. Chief executives from Waitrose and the Co-op have already pledged to supplement the vouchers with additional free fruit and vegetables.

On the impact of Brexit, part one of the National Food Strategy also found that the UK had a “once-in-a-lifetime​” opportunity ​to decide what kind of trading nation it wanted to be. The Government should aspire to a “gold standard level of scrutiny​”, said the report, and it called for the adoption of a statutory duty that would give parliament the opportunity to properly scrutinise any new trade deals. 

The report also urged the Government to only cut tariffs on products that met the UK’s “core standards​”. This would be achieved through verification programmes, and certification schemes should also be extended to environmental and climate protections where the impact was severe.

It urged the Government to be bolder on sustainability and accelerate its Environmental Land Management (ELM) scheme. 

Part two of the National Food Strategy is due to be published in 2021. It will include a comprehensive examination of the food system and the economics that shape it.