The Food Foundation has published its annual Broken Plate report, funded by The Nuffield Foundation, which looks into how the food system impacts citizens and the actions needed from policymakers to ensure healthy and sustainable food is available and affordable for everyone.
The report found that:
- Healthier foods are more than twice as expensive per calorie as less healthy foods, with healthier food increasing in price at twice the rate in the past two years.
- The most deprived fifth of the population would need to spend 45 per cent of their disposable income on food to afford the government-recommended healthy diet, rising to 70 per cent for households with children. The overall figure has decreased from the peak of the cost-of-living crisis (50% in 2021-22) but remains higher than the previous year’s figure (43% in 2020-21)
- Over a third (37%) of supermarket promotions on food and non-alcoholic drinks are for unhealthy items
- A quarter (26%) of places to buy food in England are fast-food outlets, rising to nearly 1 in 3 in the most deprived fifth of areas
- Over a third (36%) of food and soft drink advertising spend is on confectionary, snacks, deserts and soft drinks, compared to just 2 per cent for fruit and veg, and has increased (up from 33% in 2022)
The report brings together data from a range of sources and reveals a food system that has health inequalities built into it.
In the UK, healthier food is now more expensive and less available to those on lower incomes, with the situation having got worse rather than better in the last couple of years across several key metrics.
The report also found that the food environment is having a negative impact on health outcomes, with children from deprived backgrounds suffering the most.
While children across all income groups are consuming significantly less healthy foods, and significantly more unhealthy foods than recommended for good health, children from the most deprived income quintile consume 20 per cent less fruit and vegetables than the least deprived income quintile (2.1 portions/day compared to 2.6 portions/day respectively).
Children in the most deprived fifth of the population were further found to be nearly twice as likely to be living with obesity as those in the least deprived fifth by their first year of school.
Deprived groups are much more likely to be affected by type 2 diabetes, and, as a result, people with diabetes in the most deprived quintile were almost three times more likely to experience a lower-limb amputation than the least deprived quintile in 2022.
Similarly, children in their last year of primary school in the most deprived areas are more than twice as likely to have experienced tooth decay in their adult teeth (23%) compared to those in the least deprived areas (10%).
Anna Taylor, Executive Director of The Food Foundation, said, “The Broken Plate report sadly shows that our food system is failing to provide large swathes of the population with the basic nutrition needed for them to stay healthy and thrive.
“There is a tragic imbalance in the UK between the food that is marketed, available and affordable, and foods that are healthy and sustainable.
“Often it is the most vulnerable children in our society who suffer the worst consequences of this. Not only can lack of nutrition lead to serious health conditions, it can also lead to children being unable to concentrate in school and have lasting negative impact on mental health, entrenching inequalities from a young age.
“The government has recently announced that it has started working on a National Food Strategy. We hope that this will be seized as an opportunity to tackle these inequalities through cross departmental working, with acknowledgement that key changes to the food system can help to achieve Labour’s missions, from economic growth, to breaking down barriers to opportunity to relieving pressure on the NHS.”
In recent months we’ve seen confirmation of the ban on junk food adverts online and on TV before 9pm, the government’s Chief Medical Adviser, Chris Whitty, calling for the government to introduce a sugar tax on unhealthy foods, and the announcement by government of a new National Food Strategy.
These are signs that there is an increasing awareness of the important role that the food system and diet have to play in relieving pressure on the NHS, ensuring people are healthy enough to work, strengthening the economy and achieving climate goals.
The Broken Plate report’s findings, however, are a stark reminder that there is a lot more still to be done if we are to see improvements across a complex food system that has become an active driver of health inequalities.
The report publication is timely as Wes Streeting is expected to respond to a previous report from the House of Lords Committee on Food, Diet and Obesity which forcefully called for the government to fix our broken food system and turn the tide on the public health emergency by the end of the month.
Steve Reed, the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, is also expected to announce more detail on the National Food Strategy and next steps in its development, in due course.
Henry Dimbleby, the former government food tsar and author of the last National Food Strategy, said, “This report couldn’t come at a more critical moment.
“As the government rolls out its new food strategy, addressing the incentives that drive the sale and aggressive marketing of unhealthy foods must be a top priority. The human and economic toll is too great to ignore any longer.”