Making the healthy choice, the easy choice. Menu changes planned for Hamilton Recreation centres and arenas
Hamilton, ON – Menu changes are planned for Hamilton Recreation Centres and Arenas. Hamilton City Council approved Recreation’s Healthy Food and Beverage Action Plan, a three year strategy to change the food environment at City of Hamilton Recreation centres and arenas. As a collaboration between the Recreation Division and Public Health Services’ Healthy Environments Division, the Recreation Healthy Food and Beverage Action Plan aims to ensure that publically-owned recreation facilities foster an environment that promotes a healthy lifestyle through both physical activity, and healthy food and beverage options.
A key focus of the Recreation Health Food and Beverage Action Plan is on strategies to promote both access to municipal drinking water and the benefits of healthy eating through new food offerings and strategies. The implementation of the plan will be guided by the following six principles:
- Access to Healthy Food and Beverages
- Free and Convenient Access to Tap Water
- Environmentally-Sustainable Drinking Water Services
- Financially-Sustainable Food Services
- Availability of Nutrition Information for Customers
- Socially-Responsible Marketing
The Action Plan outlines a phased-in approach to introduce more healthy food and beverage options at recreation facilities, increase use of tap water as the healthiest option, reduce reliance/prominence of sugary drinks and bottled water through a city-wide policy that would make nutritious food more consistently available in City of Hamilton Recreation centres, arenas and vending machines.
“Making available healthier food choices at municipal recreation centres promotes wellness from an early age and ensures the city supports balancing diet and healthy active lifestyles.” - Mayor Fred Eisenberger
Some of the highlights from the this three year plan will include new food and beverage guidelines that help procure and promote options informed by Eating Well with Canada’s Food Guide. This will include new food promotion strategies that encourage healthy choices by grouping items into three ‘traffic light’ categories: Green, Yellow, Red.
There will also be a continued focus on reducing reliance on bottled water, and ensuring sugary drinks won’t be positioned more prominently than water. As part of this three year plan, recreation centres and arenas will implement strategies to promote tap water as the best choice for hydration and outlining improvements in tap water accessibility, stocking reusable bottles, increasing visibility and promotion in order to reduce reliance on bottled water at recreation centres and arenas.
“It was a privilege to move the motion for first steps toward a ban on City sales of bottled water, two years ago. We have a duty to protect our freshwater and all of our natural environment. The qualified ban will help the City achieve those aims. It will move us closer to being a truly green and healthy community.”- Councillor Aidan Johnson, Ward 1
The Recreation Healthy Food and Beverage Action Plan builds on progress made to date towards improving the nutrition environment in City-owned recreation facilities including reducing trans fats in fries and frying oil, standardizing beverage serving sizes, introducing healthier bars and expanding dairy offerings.The Recreation Healthy Food Action Plan also aligns with Hamilton’s 10 Year Food Strategy Recommendation 9: Increase the amount of healthy, local food in publicly owned facilities to make the healthy choice the easy choice and Action 9.1: Reduce access to unhealthy foods in public facilities, particularly where vulnerable groups visit (e.g. children).
“Our City recreation facilities are key community assets that promote and support active lifestyles. Taking steps to ensure that our food and beverage offerings also support health, and also create a healthier environment by reducing our reliance on bottled water is a step forward in ensuring Hamilton is a safe and supportive city where people are active, healthy, and have a high quality of life.” - Paul Johnson, General Manager, Healthy and Safe Communities Department
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