The WHO European Ministerial Conference on Counteracting Obesity, organised by the World Health Organisation (WHO) Regional Office for Europe and hosted by the Government of Turkey, took place in Istanbul on 15-17 November 2006.
The Conference aimed to place obesity high on the public health and political agendas, in order to foster greater awareness and high-level political commitment towards action and to promote international and intersectoral partnerships.
During the Conference, Ministers of Health of the WHO – European Region Member States adopted a European Charter on Counteracting Obesity , which will provide political guidance to strengthen action in the Region.
The Charter acknowledges the need for action at national level and it specifically refers to the introduction of legislation restricting the advertising of unhealthy foods to children.
WHO awards for good practice counteracting obesity
During the Conference, the WHO Regional Office presented a series of awards acknowledging good practice in activities that contribute to counteracting obesity. The awards went to many initiatives at local and national level that promoted healthy eating and physical activity, especially amongst children. Governmental authorities carried out most of the initiatives, but there were a few that were awarded to projects implemented by other organisations, such as NGOs and public private partnerships (with the fruit and vegetables producers in Ireland).
EPHA’s activities during the Conference
EPHA had the opportunity to work together with other health and consumer NGOs in preparation for the WHO Ministerial Conference.
A result of this fruitful cooperation was the pre-NGO meeting held on the 14th November in the premises of the Ministerial Conference, where all the NGOs that took part in the Conference (be it as part of a national delegation, as official WHO partners or as invited through satellite events) had the opportunity to organise their interventions and to agree on a set of objectives for the Ministerial Conference.
Another event co-organised by EPHA and BEUC was the lunch seminar on marketing of unhealthy foods to children, which had a good participation and resulted in very concrete recommendations to Member States.
Finally, EPHA was in charge of issuing the daily NGO Newsletter “Counteracting Obesity Newsletter” (see the three issues below) which compiled articles from health and consumer NGOs, researchers, universities and institutes of public health on the topic of Counteracting obesity. It also included the highlights of each day.
