Children often lack the nutrition they need for their long-term health, particularly due to lack of preference or access to fruits and vegetables. In addition, children's early experiences with food shape their eating patterns later in life, making early intervention important. Food and nutrition education programs are being explored as a means to increase children's intake of healthy foods. Some main variants of these educational programs include classroom lessons, garden projects, where children gain experience gardening as well as exposure to foods, and sensory exploration, gaining multi...
Children often lack the nutrition they need for their long-term health, particularly due to lack of preference or access to fruits and vegetables. In addition, children's early experiences with food shape their eating patterns later in life, making early intervention important. Food and nutrition education programs are being explored as a means to increase children's intake of healthy foods. Some main variants of these educational programs include classroom lessons, garden projects, where children gain experience gardening as well as exposure to foods, and sensory exploration, gaining multi-sensory experience with food, particularly with taste. Methods that familiarize children with healthy foods (especially focused around taste) have improved healthy food behaviors, and preference for and willingness to try fruits and vegetables. These can be coupled with educational programs to increase children's knowledge of foods and nutrition. Garden-based interventions have been found to be highly enjoyable for many children, while also leading to an increase in asking for fruits and vegetables at home.
See this solution in action in different contexts and settings around the world
Learn more about this solution through studies, articles, business cases, and other information
Connect to others working on and with this solution around the world
Engage with our “backcasting tool” to imagine and design “pathways to uptake” for this solution in your setting.
This process involves defining a future vision of this solution being used in your context, and then working “backwards” to identify necessary steps to achieve this vision by 2030. Going through this exercise as an individual or with a team can help to clarify the WHAT/WHEN/HOW of moving a solution (or package of solutions) towards having major impact. We hope these pathways will inspire outside-of-the-box thinking, creative approaches, and actionable concrete steps to move ideas into action.
Pathway builder
Population in urban area's in Kenya will have easy access and availability to high quality, healthy, diverse and safe foods through improved infrastructure, better policies and more education on healthy diets to create a healthier population.
By 2030, a more biodiverse food system with a main goal of lower meat and higher vegetable consumption will be created in rural Netherlands by increasing land use for human consumption, providing education to promote healthier sustainable diets, reducing sedentary lifestyle, and reducing food waste.