ABSTRACT
In an ideological world where the consumer is ostensibly sovereign, the notion of a ‘food culture’ is a more robust way of understanding people’s beliefs and behaviours regarding food: the concept is central to food and health and to which ideas about diet will dominate the consumer’s mind. Business spends huge sums of money trying to mould and respond to consumer aspirations: by contrast, governments deliver huge amounts of rhetoric but very little money on urging consumers to change their diet. The ‘consciousness’ industries are now competing with public health education to shape food culture and food policies. That a homogeneous ‘food culture’ simply no longer exists is becoming a new reality for food policy.
