Taking action to protect children from the harmful impact of food marketing: a child rights-based approach

Overview

This joint UNICEF and WHO publication aims to guide governments and partners through the steps to introduce policies to protect children from the harmful impact of food marketing.

Structured into three parts, the first part describes the impact of food marketing on children and identifies the main developments and challenges in the marketing landscape observed in the past decade. Part 2 outlines why a child rights-based approach can and should be used by governments to restrict food marketing. Part 3 identifies how governments can take action to restrict food marketing and is organized by the main stages in a policy cycle: policy preparation, policy development, implementation (including enforcement and monitoring for compliance), and monitoring and evaluation for policy impact.

This publication expands on previous guidance and outlines steps to strengthen the government’s position against legal challenges, it outlines oppositional tactics and common arguments used against policies and provides counterarguments based on a child rights-based approach and the available scientific evidence.

This joint UNICEF and WHO publication complements WHO’s recent Guideline on Policies to protect children from the harmful impact of food marketing.

News

WHO and UNICEF release toolkit to help countries protect children from harmful food marketing