ABSTRACT
The growth in obesity and other nutrition related disorders among young people demands a search for strategies that can counteract this development. According to the cross-national study on the Health Behaviour of School-aged Children (Meija et al 2013), a large number of young people do not meet the recommendations for good nutrition and physical activity. School based strategies are among the most promising, and the growing interest in school-based, public health nutrition strategies is reflected in the growing number of peer reviewed papers in the field (Campbell et al. 2001, Foster et al. 2008, Moore et al. 2014) as well as in the number of policy and strategy papers from both governments and intergovernmental organisations (WHO, 2006, EU commission, 2007, World Food Program, 2013, Wollgast et al 2014)
The rationale for taking action in schools is obvious. Lifestyle and behavioural patterns are founded early in life and studies have shown that
health status has a tendency to track into adulthood (Whitaker et al. 1997; Wright et al. 2001). The same can be seen for behaviour (Birch et al 2007; Mikkilä et al 2005); studies have shown that children are more likely to accept new foods at a young age than later in life (Skinner et al 2002; Neumark-Sztainer et al 2011). Nearly all children attend school for up to 13 years, and studies have shown that close to 40% pupil’s daily energy intake comes from food consumed during school hours (Bell & Swinburn 2004, Sanigorski et al 2005).
