Healthy eating and nutrition project guidance

This guidance has been developed to enable applicants to create healthy eating projects or incorporate healthy eating into their active lifestyle programmes. The guidance links to the Active Richmond Fund priorities and criteria, outlining Public Health Richmond's healthy eating outcomes.

Eatwell definition

"A healthy, balanced diet is vital to enable optimal health and wellbeing. In eating a wide variety of foods in the right proportions, we ensure enough intake of the nutrients essential for health. Forming part of healthy eating, good nutrition is not simply defined as following a diet which is low in fat, salt and sugar, rather it is eating a wide range of nourishing foods to enable the body to function well and help to protect against disease. This includes eating essential vitamins and minerals, as well as an appropriate energy (calorie) and macronutrients (fat, protein and carbohydrate) intake." Richmond Council JSNA, 2021

Applicants should consider how their project fits with this definition. Additionally, proposals should outline how they will incorporate at least one of the principles of the Public Health England's (2016) Eatwell Guide.

Outcomes

The Active Richmond Fund healthy eating funding stream has a specific set of outcomes that your project should seek to achieve. The project should meet at least one of these:

1. Providing education and skills building on healthy eating (Essential)
2. Increasing accessibility or availability of healthier food
3. Promoting the acceptability of healthy eating
4. Building capacity for healthy food provision

1. Providing education and skills building on healthy eating (Essential)

Applicants should think about what educational frameworks and teaching could be developed to meet this outcome. Project participants could benefit in one or more of the following ways:

• Improving their knowledge of nutrition
• Improving cooking skills to cook healthier meals
• Improving their confidence in relation to cooking healthier on a budget in the future
• Increasing the number of meals cooked 'from scratch' at home
• Decreasing the consumption of processed food in a week
• Developing confidence to cook healthy meals regularly

The above were developed from Public Health England's Evaluation of weight management, physical activity and dietary interventions.

Example: Setting up a quarterly four-week cook and eat programme offering educational courses that teaches individuals how to cook healthy meals and provides nutritional advice and support.

2. Increasing accessibility or availability of healthier food

When planning your project, you should think about how effectively you can introduce and expand the provision of healthier nutritious food according to the Eatwell Guide. The benefits could include:

• Increasing the proportion of healthier foods available at your event/service
• Increasing the number of people making healthier food choices during your event
• Increasing the number of people saying that they have easy access to healthy food options when attending your event/service

Example: Introducing greater availability of healthier refreshments across all projects and services.

3. Promoting the acceptability of healthy eating

This involves changing people’s perceptions around food so that they embrace healthier choices and healthier nutritious eating in a positive way. This could involve increasing the visibility of healthy foods or utilising healthy eating nudges or a 'call to action' by offering the healthier food option with nutritional information to make informed choices. Your project should seek to:

• Increase the number of people making healthier food choices
• Increase the number of people agreeing that eating lighter food keeps their body in good health
• Increase the number of people agreeing that the healthiness of the food they eat is important to them

There are a number of resources and information that you can use to develop and implement acceptability behaviours:

• Strategies for Encouraging Healthier 'Out of Home' Food Provision - Local Government Association
• Four simple ways to apply behavioural insights – The Behaviour Insight Team
• Changing behaviours in public health, to nudge or to shove? – Local Government Association

Example: Adapting existing or creating resources and advice that promote healthier choices available at community centres, foodbanks and food hubs etc. Healthier items placed at eye level and portion size is reduced for unhealthy items.

4. Building capacity for healthy food provision

Applicants should consider what infrastructure they need to develop in order to expand healthier food options. These outputs could include:

• Increase storage and space for healthy food provision
• Increase the number of community facilities offering food
• Developing food preparation spaces, purchasing equipment or kitchen facilities

Example: Setting up a community garden for growing and producing organic food. Building a new kitchen facility open for community use that has ample storage and worktop space to prepare healthy food.

The following resources and information can help you make best use of community spaces to achieve the priorities of the fund:

• Growing Connections: Guide to an inclusive and welcoming community garden – Sustain
• Garden and Health: Implications for policy and practice – The Kings Fund

Monitoring and evaluation

If your application is successful, you will be required to complete a monitoring and evaluation form at the end of your project. Applicants should consider how they can measure their outcomes and develop an appropriate evaluation framework.

Food hygiene and standards

View resources and advice to help you ensure your project meets food hygiene and standards:

• Food hygiene and standards - London Borough of Richmond upon Thames
• Food safety for community cooking and food banks - Food Standards Agency

Contact information

If you have any questions about the application process, please contact Clarinda Chan, Community Grants Officer on 020 8487 5112 or email ActiveRichmondFund@richmond.gov.uk.

If you require advice on how to develop your healthy eating proposal or have questions about the outcomes, please contact:

Lee Pittock, Public Health Lead (Healthy Eating, Obesity and Prevention of Long Term Conditions): lee.pittock@richmondandwandsworth.gov.uk