Analysing food marketing to children and obesity policy

Background

There is strong evidence that food marketing to children influences their food preferences and the foods they eat. Targeting childhood obesity is a priority of the NSW Premier and restricting unhealthy food marketing has been recommended by authorities including NSW Government reports and the World Health Organization’s Commission on Ending Childhood Obesity.

Our research team included student dietitians through a partnership with the University of Wollongong and the University of Sydney where we support their workplace training. Our research into food marketing is contributing to the evidence base on the range of ways children are exposed to food marketing as part of their normal life.

The research

• Using advertising data collected in 2015, the research team compared the rate of food and drink advertising on Sydney television with earlier studies from 2006 to 2011 to see whether levels of junk food advertising have changed since the introduction of self-regulatory codes developed by the food industry.
• They found no change in the rate of unhealthy food advertisements in children’s viewing times between 2011 (3.0 ads per hour) and 2015 (3.1 ads per hour).
• The research team also looked at the amount of unhealthy food sponsorship of children’s sports development programs. They found 10 unhealthy food and drink brands among the sponsors of 56 children’s sports programs. The most common of these were fast food, confectionery and sugary drink brands.