Report 2013 - Talking obesity: consumer co-operatives leading the way

30 Best practices from consumer co-operatives across Europe

Edition 2013

 Obesity Report 2013 download

Foreword

Yet, industry claims to be playing their part in fighting these trends, while public health NGOs watch them closely. At Euro Coop, we witness this debate at almost every meeting of the European Platform for Action on Diet, Physical Activity and Health.

We represent 19 national associations of consumer co-operatives across Europe, which operate as retailers but are democratically controlled by consumers. They have a sound knowledge of consumer habits and ultimately act in their interest. We would like to bring our cooperative values into the discussion, in particular those of dialogue and collaboration.

That is why we are proud to present you the second edition of the report “Talking obesity: Consumer cooperatives leading the way”. The report gathers the most significant examples of concrete initiatives that our members are conducting in order to ease consumer healthy (eating) habits. As we know, this can be done through different tools: responsible marketing, education campaigns, supporting of physical activity, product reformulation.

Nevertheless, we believe that some tools might be more successful than others: this happens when there is a deep involvement of consumers, as part of a community. As you will see, many of the actions reported here are conducted from consumer cooperatives in partnership with other stakeholders, both public and private. We are convinced that in order to achieve concrete results, it is needed a coordinated and cooperative approach.

We hope that both our fellow cooperators and our institutional interlocutors will find this report inspiring and that it serves as model for other actors of the food chain to develop sustainable initiatives which promote healthy lifestyles and make healthy choices the easiest option.

Enjoy your reading!