Thank you very much, Madam Chair. I am very pleased to be here today with my colleagues from the Public Health Agency of Canada and the Canadian Institutes of Health Research.
Eating plays an important role in promoting health and reducing the risk of nutrition-related chronic diseases. The federal health department has been providing leadership in nutrition since the 1930s and has a long history in health promotion and chronic disease prevention. Documents like the Ottawa Charter for Health Promotion brought in the traditional view of health and spurred ground-breaking advancements in health promotion. Nutrition was an integral part of the health promotion thinking then, as it is today.
We know that Canada is a different place than it was 30 years ago and that our socio-demographic and cultural profile has changed. Today Canadians live in an environment that poses unprecedented challenges to the goal of healthy eating. There has been a significant evolution of the range of foods available in the marketplace. Time pressures faced by busy families have changed the way Canadians eat. That's why we need to create social and physical environments that support healthy eating and make healthy choice the easy choice for Canadians. This requires a comprehensive, multi-sectoral approach that uses a range of policy and program tools and levers.
Canada is already making important strides. As Mrs. Elmslie mentioned, the endorsement of a Declaration on Prevention and Promotion by Ministers of Health further emphasizes the importance of making the promotion of health and the prevention of disease a priority for action in all jurisdictions across the country.
The endorsement of the first report entitled Actions Taken and Future Directions 2011 on curbing childhood obesity at the November 2011 Health Ministers Meeting is also an important milestone in helping to advance healthy eating efforts in Canada.
Action to improve nutrition and healthy eating is a shared responsibility among different levels of government, non-governmental organizations, industry and Canadians. Health Canada has a critical national leadership role to play in supporting healthy eating through the development of national nutrition policies and guidelines, enhancing the evidence base to support policy decisions, monitoring and reporting on what Canadians are eating and providing Canadians with information, through education and awareness initiatives, to help them to make informed healthy eating choices.
The most well-known national nutrition policy developed by Health Canada is likely our Eating Well with Canada's Food Guide. The food guide promotes a pattern of eating that will meet nutrient needs, promote health, and minimize the risk of nutrition-related chronic diseases. It's not only designed to help explain to Canadians what healthy eating means, it's also an important policy that underpins nutrition and health policies and standards across the country and serves as a basis for a wide variety of nutrition initiatives. The food guide was developed using the best evidence to translate the science of nutrition and health into a healthy eating pattern for Canadians. Health Canada has distributed nearly 22 million copies of the food guide since its release in 2007. In 2010 the food guide's home page was the second most-viewed page on the Health Canada website.
While the food guide is an important policy that defines healthy eating, it's only one component of a range of actions needed to improve the nutritional health of Canadians. Health Canada's work to provide health professionals with the latest nutritional advice related to prenatal nutrition and infant feeding guidelines are other examples of how the department translates evidence to support and promote healthy eating through specific life-stage guidance. For instance, this year we released revised gestational weight guidelines for health professionals, and consumer materials to help both health professionals and expectant mothers manage weight gain during pregnancy. We're currently working on revising infant feeding guidelines for health professionals through a joint process with the Dietitians of Canada, the Canadian Paediatric Society, and the Breastfeeding Committee for Canada.
Policies and programs that support healthy eating require a strong evidence base and a capacity to measure progress and outcomes. The external community is a significant source of information, nutrition science, and evidence on effective interventions, allowing us to tap into the best and brightest for any given nutrition issue. This broad reach enhances our leadership capacity in nutrition and ensures that the most effective nutrition solutions are delivered to Canadians. A key example is the collaboration between Canada and the U.S. through the Institute of Medicine to support dietary reference levels. They are the scientific underpinnings for national dietary guidance.
Monitoring and reporting on what Canadians are eating, and on the factors that influence food choice and nutritional health outcomes are also major components of Health Canada's work, including the analysis and sharing of nutrition data from the Canadian community health survey, which focused on nutrition in 2004. It was the first time in 30 years that a comprehensive survey was done on what Canadians were eating. This survey will be repeated again in 2015, which will help us to understand changing food and nutrient consumption patterns and see how eating patterns in Canadians align with our efforts to support healthy eating.
Healthy eating education and awareness activities are also key components of work at Health Canada. In collaboration with the provinces and territories, we are developing multi-year Healthy Eating Awareness and Education initiatives that will provide clear and consistent healthy eating messages for Canadians. We continue to enhance efforts to improve consumers' understanding of nutrition labelling, through initiatives such as the Nutrition Facts Education Campaign. Earlier this year you may have seen our ads on TV that promote the understanding and use of the Nutrition Facts table, specifically the % Daily Value found on packaged food labels, and encourage Canadians to look for more information on Health Canada's Web site. This campaign is an innovative example of how stakeholders who share responsibility for promoting healthy eating, such as the food industry, health professional associations and non-governmental organizations, can work together.
The Eat Well and Be Active Educational Toolkit, developed with our colleagues at the Public Health Agency of Canada, is an example of integrating healthy eating and physical activity. The toolkit includes the Eat Well and Be Active Every Day educational poster and downloadable activity plans. It is designed to help health educators teach children and adults about healthy eating and physical activity and to encourage them to take action to maintain and improve their health.
Reaching out to other groups, such as health professionals, researchers, policy-makers and academics, allows us to leverage expertise, enhance collaboration, cooperation and alignment of efforts to support healthy eating in Canada. This includes working closely with our provincial and territorial government colleagues.
Let me conclude by stating that healthy eating continues to play an important role in promoting health and reducing the risk of chronic disease. We're committed to continuing our efforts to promote the nutritional health of Canadians.
Thank you very much for the opportunity to present today.