There are strong policies in place to support this work. The World Health Organization's global action plan on physical activity looks to implement effective and coordinated international, national and subnational action to increase physical activity and reduce sedentary behaviour. This global action plan has four primary objectives: create active societies, create active environments, create active people and create active systems.
These actions address governance, leadership, multisectoral partnerships, workforce capabilities, advocacy, information systems and financing mechanisms across all relevant sectors. This work directly connects to the UN sustainable development goals.
Nationally, to address the inactivity crisis, Canada has developed a policy document titled “A Common Vision for Increasing Physical Activity and Reducing Sedentary Living in Canada: Let's Get Moving”, which serves to complement and align with other relevant policies, strategies and frameworks. In that document, specific emphasis is placed on the importance of physical literacy in increasing physical activity. The common vision has six areas of focus and eight areas of convergence.
A Canadian strategy needs to build on the very good current global and national policies with a wide range of strategies to get people active, with physical literacy a central area of convergence. This needs to be done right down to the local level.
We know that change happens at the local level.