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Galway City Partnership has recently taken part in Safefood’s new national conversation on how to improve their local food environment. The initiative is part of Safefood’s ongoing public health campaign “Talk about Food” which aims to raise awareness of the unhealthy food environment around us and consider how to build a better one. Communities across 15 towns and villages on the island of Ireland have been selected to talk about the food that they encounter locally and their vision of how to make it healthier for them and their children. Some of the ideas from recent groups have included shared community cooking spaces where people could cook together and share their ideas about homecooked food; and ways to restrict unhealthy snack foods on display in shops and ideas on how to make fruit and vegetables more easily available everywhere. Previous research from Safefood found that 8 in 10 adults (82% ) said they saw special offers for unhealthy foods whenever they go to their local shop. A further seven in 10 (71% ) said they saw unhealthy foods for sale in non-food locations like bookshops, hardware stores and leisure centres. Commenting, Dr Gary A. Kearney, CEO of Safefood said that with this community engagement programme, they want to hear what people across the country think about the extent to which they are surrounded at every turn during their daily lives by unhealthy food and listen to their ideas for how we could build a healthier environment. “For many years, public health bodies have been encouraging people to eat healthily, but this is virtually impossible in an environment that doesn’t support it. By having these conversations and talking about food in local communities, we want to spark debate and ideas at a grassroots level in order to build healthier communities and lives," he said. For more information about Safefood’s “Talk about Food” campaign, please visit safefood.net/talk-about-food
