Increasing fruit and vegetable intake among manufacturing workers

Vegetable interventions at unconventional occasions: the effect of freely available snack vegetables at workplace meetings on consumption

Purpose

Snacks at work are often of poor dietary quality. The main objective of the current study is to examine the effect of making vegetable snacks available at workplace meetings on consumption.

Design/methodology/approach

In three between-subjects field experiments conducted at a hospital and three ministries in the Netherlands, with meeting as the unit of condition assignment, attendees were exposed to an assortment of vegetables, varying in vegetable variety and presence of promotional leaflet in study 1 (N = 136 meetings), serving container in study 2 (N = 88 meetings) and additional presence of cookies in study 3 (N = 88 meetings). Consumption of vegetables and cookies was measured at meeting level to assess grams consumed per person.

Findings

Across the three studies, average consumption per meeting attendee was 74 g (SD = 43) for study 1; 78 g (SD = 43) for study 2 and 87 g (SD = 35) for study 3. In the first study, manipulation of perceived variety and information leaflets did not affect intake. In the second study, significantly more vegetables were eaten when they were offered in single sized portions (M = 97 g, SD = 45) versus in a shared multiple portions bowl (63 g, SD = 38) (p < 0.001). In the third study, no effect was found of the additional availability of cookies on vegetable consumption during the meeting.

Practical implications

The present studies show how availability of vegetables at unconventional occasions makes meeting attendants consume considerable portions of vegetables on average. As such, offering healthy snacks at the workplace may be a valuable part of workplace health promotion programs and positively change the “office cake culture”.

Originality/value

Vegetable intake is less than recommended in many countries worldwide. Many snacking occasions are at work, which makes office meetings a potential consumption occasion to encourage vegetable intake. Hence, the aim of this study is to examine whether free availability of vegetable snacks during meetings contributes to their consumption among meeting attendees and under what conditions consumption is optimal.

Consolidating evidence on the effectiveness of interventions promoting fruit and vegetable consumption: an umbrella review

BACKGROUND

The overarching objective was to examine the effectiveness of intervention strategies to promote fruit and vegetable consumption. To do this, systematic review evidence regarding the effects of intervention strategies was synthesized; organized, where appropriate, by the setting in which the strategies were implemented. Additionally, we sought to describe gaps in the review of evidence; that is, where evidence regarding the effectiveness of recommended policy actions had not been systematically synthesised.

METHODS

We undertook a systematic search of electronic databases and the grey literature to identify systematic reviews describing the effects of any intervention strategy targeting fruit and/or vegetable intake in children or adults of any age.

RESULTS

The effects of 32 intervention strategies were synthesised from the 19 included reviews. The strategies were mapped across all three broad domains of the NOURISHING framework (i.e. food environment, food system and behaviour change communication), but covered just 14 of the framework's 65 sub-policy areas. There was evidence supporting the effectiveness of 19 of the 32 intervention strategies. The findings of the umbrella review suggest that intervention strategies implemented within schools, childcare services, homes, workplaces and primary care can be effective, as can eHealth strategies, mass media campaigns, household food production strategies and fiscal interventions.

CONCLUSIONS

A range of effective strategy options are available for policy makers and practitioners interested in improving fruit and/or vegetable intake. However, the effects of many strategies - particularly those targeting agricultural production practices, the supply chain and the broader food system - have not been reported in systematic reviews. Primary studies assessing the effects of these strategies, and the inclusion of such studies in systematic reviews, are needed to better inform national and international efforts to improve public health nutrition.

TRIAL REGISTRATION

The review protocol was deposited in a publicly available Open Science framework prior to execution of the search strategy. https://osf.io/unj7x/.