The PolMark Project
Project summary
On completion of The PolMark Project, a detailed summary and evaluation of actions was completed.
Final Report: Provides an overview of the activities that took place as part of The Polmark Project, including some evaluation of each aspect of work
Annex 1: Provides a detailed account of the food marketing regulations across a number of countries around the world
Annex 2: Provides an overview of stakeholder views on marketing, as well as detailed reports from a number of European countries
Annex 3: Presents findings on the relationship between stakeholder power and their perceived impact of marketing using Health Impact Assessments
Annex 4: Presents a detailed evaluation of each action taken, as well as examples of dissemination routes such as press releases and media coverage
PolMark – Policies on Marketing Food and Beverages to Children – aims to help policy-makers understand what determines children’s dietary choices and health outcomes-and in particular to look at the current regulatory framework for promoting food to children. The results will help the European Commission’s public health work plan for 2007 which aims to support policy-making around the marketing of food to children in member states.
The project ran from June 2008 to December 2009. It was co-funded by the European Commission’s Executive Agency for Health and Consumers, the Norwegian Health Directorate and the UK National Heart Forum.
Project objectives
- To promote an understanding of current and anticipated regulatory controls
- To improve the understanding of stakeholders' views on the opportunities and challenges for policy development
- To research the relationships between stakeholders’ positions on marketing controls and their capacity to influence policy
Project achievements
- We have published a report on the range and nature of current advertising regulations on food and beverage marketing to children in 27 EU member states, thus updating earlier WHO reviews that have formed the basis of EU policy discussions;
- We have completed 169 stakeholder interviews in 11 EU member states with high-level representation from academic experts, clinical scientists, government advisors, consumer groups, health advocacy groups, children and family advocates, school and community representatives, media organisations, journalists, food producers, advertising agencies and government officials;
- We have made presentations of the project to the European Commission’s Platform on Diet, Physical Activity and Health, the World Health Organisation consultation on marketing to children, the WHO European Network on reducing marketing pressures on children and at the International Congress on Obesity 2010.
Completing the project
While officially complete, to continue to build on our achievements to date, we will:
- Strengthen national and community policy-makers by providing the latest information on how best to intervene on marketing foods and beverages to children and by refining tools for Health Impact Assessment;
- Improve the European Commission’s ability in 2010 to review its previous support for the voluntary regulation of marketing to children;
- Inform the WHO European Network and the WHO headquarters’ consultation on marketing to children;
- Enhance the ability of policy-makers to implement the European Charter on Counteracting Obesity, the WHO Second European Food and Health Action Plan, and the Action Plan on Non-Communicable Diseases called for at the 2007 World Health Assembly;
- Facilitate collaboration between research initiatives by contributing data to current Commission-funded projects on obesity policy;
- Encourage future citation and use of the PolMark approach to Health Impact Assessment among researchers concerned with health impacts in other fields.
The PolMark project has received funding from the European Union, in the framework of the Public Health Programme.