HEPA Europe 2016: Big Food Sponsorship of Physical Activity Schemes

The HEPA Europe Conference was held 28th-30th of September, 2016 at Queens University, Belfast. As part of the conference I delivering an oral presentation of a study that my colleague, Kass Gibson and I have been working on.

The study made use of a content analysis of the twitter feed #ParkLives to explore the extent that ParkLives is being used to market the brand to children and to consider how the wider socio-ecological environment might be influenced.

Personal lifestyle choices, such as the food and drink we consume are heavily influenced by the choices that are put in front of us and Corporate Social Responsibility projects such as ParkLives could be used to recruit allies, co-opt critics and direct opinion on the determinants of a range of public health issues away from corporate influence and toward personal responsibility.

This page contains a version of the oral presentation and links to related articles. You can find out what happened in the rest of the conference, via twitter here.

Update: The paper that was published as a result of this work is as follows: Jane, B., & Gibson, K. (2017). Corporate sponsorship of physical activity promotion programmes: part of the solution or part of the problem?. Journal of Public Health, 1-10. https://doi.org/10.1093/pubmed/fdx065

References

Berkman, L. F., Kawachi, I., & Glymour, M. M. (Eds.). (2014). Social epidemiology. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Brownell, K. D., & Warner, K. E. (2009). The perils of ignoring history: Big tobacco played dirty and millions died. How similar is big food. Milbank Quarterly, 87(1), 259–294.

Du, S., Bhattacharya, C. B., & Sen, S. (2010). Maximizing business returns to corporate social responsibility (CSR): The role of CSR communication. International Journal of Management Reviews,12(1), 8–19.

Hastings, G., & de Andrade, M. (2016). Stakeholder marketing and the subversion of public health. In F. Spotswood (Ed.), Beyond Behaviour Change: Key Issues, Interdisciplinary Approaches and Future Directions (pp. 181–198). Bristol: Policy Press.

Herrick, C. (2009). Shifting blame/selling health: Corporate social responsibility in the age of obesity. Sociology of Health and Illness, 31(1), 51–65.

Leone, L., Ling, T., Baldassarre, L., Barnett, L. M., Capranica, L., & Pesce, C. (2015). Corporate responsibility for childhood physical activity promotion in the UK. Health Promotion International, 1–14. doi: 10.1093/heapro/dav051

Peloza, J., Ye, C., & Montford, W. J. (2015). When Companies Do Good, Are Their Products Good for You? How Corporate Social Responsibility Creates a Health Halo. Journal of Public Policy & Marketing, 34(1), 19–31.

Phoenix, C. (2010). Seeing the world of physical culture: the potential of visual methods for qualitative research in sport and exercise. Qualitative Research in Sport and Exercise, 2(2), 93-108.

Rose, G. (2016). Visual methodologies: An introduction to researching with visual materials. London: Sage.

Schrecker, T. (2013). Can health equity survive epidemiology? Standards of proof and social determinants of health. Preventive Medicine, 57(6), 741-744.

Yoon, S., & Lam, T.-H. (2013). The illusion of righteousness:corporate social responsibility practices of the alcohol industry. BMC Public Health, 13(1), 630.

Further Reading

McCartney, M. (2014). Is Coca-Cola’s antiobesity scheme the real thing?.BMJ;349:g4340

Gómez, L., Jacoby, E., Ibarra, L., Lucumí, D., Hernandez, A., Parra, D., … Hallal, P. (2011). Sponsorship of physical activity programs by the sweetened beverages industry: public health or public relations? Revista de Saúde Pública, 45(2), 423–427.

Coca-Cola (8th September, 2016) "Members of Parliament enjoy special ParkLives session from Coca-Cola GB to celebrate second year report"

Serodio, P., Ruskin, G, McKee, M., Stuckler, D. (2020) Evaluating Coca-Cola’s attempts to influence public health ‘in their own words’: analysis of Coca-Cola emails with public health academics leading the Global Energy Balance Network Public Health Nutrition DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/S1368980020002098

UKActive's relationship with Coca-Cola GB

UK Active ParkLives evaluations, year 1 & 2

Similar CSR Schemes

ParkLives - Coca-Cola

Belfast Bikes - Coca-Cola

Nation's Cup - Danone

Vive Saludable Escuelas - PepsiCo

Kinder+Sport - Kinder

Post date: 20-Sep-2016 11:18:18