Junk Food and Poor Policy?

Our new report, Junk Food and Poor Policy? How weak rules undermine health and economic growth in New Zealand and how to fix it, looks at how our government can take effective action to improve nutrition and health outcomes for New Zealanders. For New Zealanders to be healthy, they need to live in a healthy environment and be able to access nutritious food. If politicians fail to accept this, the same failed policies of the past will continue.

The prevailing governmental approach has been largely based on promoting personal responsibility – namely, that people can and must take responsibility for their health and the choices they make. But the food system is stacked against individuals – people cannot easily change if they live in an environment that makes that change difficult or impossible. It is no longer excusable to pursue this failed approach.

Aotearoa New Zealand needs transformative change to shift the obesity conversation from individuals’ choices to one that focuses on our commercial food environment and the social determinants of poor nutrition.

This report looks at how our current approach is deficient, and what we need to do better. The report makes three recommendations:

1. Create a commercial food environment that makes it easier to eat healthily.
2. Embed healthier food across all key public sector and educational entities such as hospitals, early childhood education, and schools to promote long-term health – particularly for children and the vulnerable.
3. Consider adopting new treatments to improve the prevention and treatment of obesity as complementary tools for those at most risk.

These changes would save lives, cost less, and protect our health system. Politicians have an opportunity here to create a healthier, more prosperous Aotearoa New Zealand.

This report builds on our previous research into the vastly different food environments that exist across Aotearoa New Zealand’s largest city, Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland. You can read that work here.

This report also draws on the report Fit for the Future: A Fair Deal on Food for a Healthier Britain, published by the Tony Blair Institute for Global Change in July 2023.

A press release associated with this report can be read here.

Latest Media

• NZHerald: Obesity challenge: Crack down on junk food ads, takeaway shops, says Helen Clark Foundation (November, 2024).
• Stuff.co.nz: WATCH: Call for political action to tackle NZ's high rates of obesity (November, 2024).
• NewstalkZB: Helen Clark Foundation calls for government intervention on obesity (November, 2024).
• Otago Daily Times: Call for urgent intervention as obesity rates soar (November, 2024).
• NewstalkZB: Kerre Woodham: We need to do something about preventing obesity (November, 2024).
• RNZ: Obesity leading risk factor for death and disability - report (November, 2024).
• RNZ: Call for urgent government intervention as obesity rates soar (November, 2024).
• Pacific Media Network: Pacific youth grapple with high vaping rates amid nationwide fall (November, 2024).
• NewstalkZB: 'Health food desert': Dave Letele calls for education and regulation as obesity stats soar (November, 2024).
• RNZ: New Zealand Dental Association supports Helen Clark Foundation obesity report (November, 2024).
• KPMG: Agri-Food Field Notes November 2024 (November, 2024).
• Otago Daily Times: Big thinking needed on obesity (January, 2025).
• NZ Herald: Australia pushes for federal junk food ad ban to protect kids’ health (January, 2025).