Accelerating the Removal of Ultra-Processed Products from Caribbean Schools

Accelerating the Removal of Ultra-Processed Products From Caribbean Schools – The Food in Our Schools Matters

July 4-5, 2023
Courtyard Marriott Hotel | Bridgetown, Barbados

On July 4-5, 2023, the Healthy Caribbean Coalition (HCC) with the support of the Pan American Health Organisation (PAHO) and the Global Health Advocacy Incubator (GHAI), hosted a regional meeting: Accelerating the removal of ultra-processed products from Caribbean schools. This meeting represented the first face-to-face convening of HCC member organisations and partners since the COVID pandemic. The aim of the meeting was to support harmonised regional acceleration of robust evidence-informed policies which regulate the availability and marketing of ultra-processed products in school settings, by bringing together diverse stakeholders.

The meeting was attended by over sixty (60) regional stakeholders hailing from ten Caribbean countries and representing a rich array of actors including those from civil society, government and academia. Local vendors associations, PTAs, principals and students also participated.

The HCC was honored to have Dr. Ramona Archer-Bradshaw, Chief Education Officer at the Barbados Ministry of Education, Technological and Vocational Training open the 2-day meeting with powerful remarks reinforcing the importance of a regional approach. Dr. Gloria Giraldo, the recently appointed NCDs and Mental Health subregional Advisor for the Caribbean, also provided opening remarks, committing PAHOs support as CARICOM countries sought to prioritise policies which removed ultra-processed products from school settings.

One of the key outcomes of the meeting was a draft regional roadmap for action. HCC and partners will be working on refining and implementing this roadmap in the coming months and into 2024.  The full details will be presented in the final meeting report which will be shared on this page once complete.

This meeting was immediately followed by a second meeting: Mobilising for 2025 – A Caribbean Civil Society NCD Forum which brought together HCC member civil society organisations (CSOs) and key stakeholders to discuss non-communicable disease (NCD) (including mental, neurological and substance use disorders – MNSDs)[1] prevention and control priorities.

Goal

To support harmonised regional acceleration of robust evidence-informed policies which remove ultra-processed products from Caribbean school settings, by bringing together diverse stakeholders including those from government, civil society and academia.

Objectives

1. To share and document regional experiences and lessons learned in the implementation of regulations banning or restricting the availability and marketing of ultra-processed products (including SSBs – sugar sweetened beverages) in school settings.
2. To discuss strategies to accelerate CARICOM-wide removal of ultra-processed products from schools through the implementation of regulations banning or restricting the availability and marketing of these unhealthy products in school settings.
3. To develop a regional roadmap that supports the accelerated CARICOM-wide removal of ultra-processed products from schools through the implementation of regulations banning or restricting the availability and marketing of these unhealthy products in school settings as part of a wider package of healthy food policies.

Expected Outcomes

1. Increased awareness, understanding and documentation of regional experiences and lessons learned in the implementation of regulations banning or restricting the availability and marketing of ultra-processed products (including SSBs – sugar sweetened beverages) in school settings.
2. Consensus on strategies to accelerate CARICOM-wide removal of ultra-processed products from schools through the implementation of regulations banning or restricting the availability and marketing of these unhealthy products in school settings.
3. Draft regional roadmap to support the accelerated CARICOM-wide removal of ultra-processed products from schools through the implementation of regulations banning or restricting the availability and marketing of these unhealthy products in school settings as part of a wider package of healthy food policies.

This meeting: Accelerating the removal of ultra-processed products from Caribbean schools represents a reconvening of face-to-face meetings of Healthy Caribbean Coalition (HCC) member organisations and partners. The aim of the meeting is to support harmonised regional acceleration of robust evidence-informed policies which regulate the availability and marketing of ultra-processed products in school settings, by bringing together diverse stakeholders, including those from government, civil society and academia.  This meeting precedes a second meeting hosted by the HCC immediately following on July 6-7, 2023. The second meeting: Mobilising for 2025 – A Caribbean Civil Society NCD Forum aims to bring together HCC member civil society organisations (CSOs) and key stakeholders to discuss non-communicable disease (NCD) (including mental, neurological and substance use disorders – MNSDs)[1] prevention and control priorities.

The Caribbean has some of the highest adult obesity rates in the world and an emerging crisis of overweight and obesity is facing up to 1 in 3 children in the region[2]. Childhood overweight and obesity not only are associated with serious complications in childhood and adolescence, but they also track into adulthood, placing individuals at higher risk for NCDs. Like many other small developing states and low- and middle-income countries, the Caribbean region has experienced a nutritional transition driven by globalisation and trade liberalisation, resulting in a culture of diets characterized by excess consumption of ultra-processed foods high in fat, salt and sugar fueling skyrocketing rates of obesity and diet-related NCDs.  Children from this region consume more sugar-sweetened beverages than anywhere in the world and more than triple the global average. Dramatic increases in overweight and obesity in recent decades has been driven by overconsumption of ultra-processed foods high in sugars, fats and salt.  In response, there is an increasing momentum across the region towards the implementation of policies which restrict or altogether ban the availability of unhealthy foods and beverages in schools.

Regulating the availability and marketing of foods in school settings is one of a package of evidence-informed policy recommendations (including taxation of sugar-sweetened beverages (SSBs) and front-of-package nutrition warning labelling) promoted by PAHO/WHO and CARPHA (6 Point policy package, 6PPP) to tackle obesogenic environments. The HCC Civil Society Action Plan 2017-2021: Preventing Childhood Obesity in the Caribbean (CSAP) further endorses these global and regional recommendations. CARICOM Member States at the highest levels have also acknowledged the scale and severity of the problem and the need for an urgent response. In 2016 at the 37th Regular Meeting of CARICOM Heads of State and Government, a pledge was made “to address issues such as banning advertisement of potentially harmful foods which specifically target children”. One year later at the 38th CARICOM Summit, in the 10-year anniversary of the Port of Spain Declaration, Heads of State and Government “noted with concern that obesity in children represented the greatest threat to the health of future generations with the level of overweight and obesity being more than 30% in both primary and secondary school populations in many Member States…and urged the promotion of physical exercise in school-age children”.  In 2018, at the 39th Summit, CARICOM Heads of State and Government endorsed a number of priorities for the 3rd UN High Level Meeting on NCDs including: “implementing policies geared to preventing childhood obesity, including health-promoting school environments and front-of-package (FOP) labelling”.  The 2023 Bridgetown Declaration on NCDs and Mental Health noted that Ministers of Health “Remain deeply concerned that SIDS show the highest rates of childhood and adult obesity worldwide and that the challenge in ensuring healthy diets and effectively responding to NCDs in SIDS is significantly constrained by high dependence on imported food, medicine and diagnostic devices, commercial influence and trade-related challenges” and have committed to a number of regulatory measures, including school food policies.

Several Caribbean countries have taken steps to ban or restrict unhealthy foods and beverages in school settings, including Bermuda, Trinidad and Tobago, Jamaica, and Barbados. The onset of the COVID-19 pandemic forced school closures and shifted priorities, placing these types of measures on hold. In 2022, as normality returned and face-to-face schooling resumed, countries began to refocus their attention on regulating the school food environments. Barbados recently launched its School Nutrition Policy, which bans all SSBs and sweetened beverages (non-caloric sweeteners) in schools, and Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines and other countries have signalled their interest in proceeding with similar restrictions.  Healthy school environments are critical to the reduction in consumption of unhealthy foods and beverages amongst children and adolescents. There are important lessons to be learned from Bermuda, Jamaica, Trinidad and Tobago, Barbados and other Caribbean countries which have attempted to introduce these types of measures or are currently planning or contemplating strong school food policies.

There are also important wider environmental considerations, including the simultaneous implementation of supportive food policies such as front-of-package warning labelling (FOPWL), which serves as a foundational policy, in that it identifies those foods which should be subject to regulation due to excess or high levels of sugars, fats and sodium (as defined by the PAHO Nutrient Profile Model).  Finally, other key actors, including civil society and young people, working closely with Ministries of Education and Health, have played a central role in supporting the introduction, implementation, enforcement and monitoring of healthy school food policies which aim to remove ultra-processed products from school settings. This meeting seeks to explore the factors which have contributed to the successes and challenges of these measures, with a view to supporting accelerated and harmonized CARICOM-wide implementation.

This meeting is supported through funding from the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) and the Global Health Advocacy Incubator (GHAI).

The work of the HCC would not be possible without the ongoing support from Sagicor Life Inc. and COMTRUST (CIBC First Caribbean).

[1] NCDs throughout this document refers to NCDs including MNSDs (mental, neurological and substance abuse disorders)

[2] HCC Civil Society Action Plan 2017-2021: Preventing Childhood Obesity in the Caribbean. Available at https://www.healthycaribbean.org/civil-society-action-plan/.