CO-CREATE

What was the CO-CREATE project?

The CO-CREATE project – Confronting Obesity: Co-creating policy with youth – brought together World Cancer Research Fund International and 13 other research and advocacy organisations to work with young people to create, inform and disseminate evidence-based policies that help prevent obesity. The project aimed to reduce childhood obesity and associated co-morbidities in Europe and the rest of the world.

The project was funded by the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme and was led by the Norwegian Institute of Public Health. The project engaged international partners from a range of countries: the UK, Norway, the Netherlands, Portugal and Poland, with input from outside Europe in Australia, the US and South Africa.

How were we involved in CO-CREATE?

World Cancer Research Fund International was responsible for policy assessment and monitoring activities within the project, to provide evaluation on how governments across Europe were addressing obesity. These tools and resources were then used throughout the project to support advocacy and policy development activities by young people across Europe.

We developed a suite of tools and resources to help collect, monitor, benchmark and assess national governments’ diet related and physical activity policy actions. The diet-related tools built on our longstanding NOURISHING diet-related policy framework and the CO-CREATE project supported an expansion of our work into physical activity policy.

Tools and resources included:

• The MOVING physical activity policy framework, which outlines the 6 areas where governments need to take action to enable people to be more physically active.
• The MOVING physical activity policy database, a global repository of physical activity policies, with an in-depth focus on 30 European countries.
• An expansion of our global NOURISHING diet-related policy database, with an in-depth focus on 30 European countries.
• The NOURISHING and MOVING policy benchmarking tools to assess the design of nutrition and diet-related policies, and physical activity policies.
• The NOURISHING and MOVING policy indexes and policy briefs, which detailed benchmarking results of diet-related and physical activity policies from 30 European countries.
• Benchmarking scores of diet-related and physical activity policies from 30 European countries in country snapshots.

Highlights of the CO-CREATE project

As part of CO-CREATE, we:

• carried out a comprehensive scan of nutrition and physical activity policy in 30 European countries and added more than 1,200 policies to our NOURISHING and MOVING databases.
• benchmarked nutrition and physical activity policy actions from 30 European countries identified through our comprehensive scan.
• developed 2 policy indexes and published the results in 2 policy briefs on the status of nutrition and physical activity policy in Europe.
• published 4 scientific papers on:

1. the development of the MOVING framework,
2. conducting a scan for physical activity policy,
3. developing a methodology to benchmark and compare policy action in nutrition and physical activity policy,
4. pilot testing a policy index to compare nutrition policy action across European countries.

• presented our work at more than 15 scientific conferences and other fora, including to youth groups and policymakers.

Our research and advocacy tools were used by national policymakers within Europe, and international organisations, such as the OECD, to inform work on NCD and cancer prevention in Europe.

Why was CO-CREATE important?

Childhood obesity is on the rise across Europe. By 2025, 1 in 5 children in Europe is expected to be overweight or obese – more than 16 million children across Europe. Being overweight or obese in adolescence (13–18 years age group) is a strong predictor of remaining so into adulthood.

World Cancer Research Fund International’s research shows that overweight and obesity is a cause of at least 13 different cancers. Excess weight and obesity have been linked to other chronic diseases including cardiovascular disease, diabetes and other metabolic disorders.