Get Cheshire Eating Well Strategy 2026-2031
Our vision for eating well
Vision
Our vision is to create a borough where everyone (children, young people, adults, and older people) regardless of their sex, race, religious belief, age, ability, income or geography, can eat well, supported by systems and environments that make healthy, sustainable, affordable, dietarily inclusive and enjoyable food the easy choice.
Aim
Our aim is to work as a system to enable, empower and support all Cheshire West and Chester residents to access an affordable, healthy, sustainable and enjoyable diet.
Core Principles
This strategy is underpinned by a series of core principles, these include:
Eating well is shaped by a complex interaction of factors including food environments, income, education, health services, and social conditions. A whole-system approach recognises that no single organisation can deliver change in isolation. Instead, it requires coordinated action across stakeholders.
This principle commits to aligning priorities and actions across organisations; sharing responsibility and accountability; coordinating interventions across settings (home, school, workplace and community); and delivering through neighbourhood and place-based partnerships, recognising the role of Family Hubs, Primary Care Networks, Integrated Neighbourhood Teams and community organisations in improving dietary health.
Eating habits and nutritional needs change throughout life, and health inequalities can build up over time.
This principle ensures that support is available at every stage of life.
Access to healthy food is not equal across the population. Factors such as income, geography, disability, and ethnicity influence people’s ability to eat well.
In line with a proportionate universalism approach, this principle ensures that the strategy prioritises communities experiencing the greatest barriers; targets resources where need is highest; addresses structural issues such as cost, transport, and food availability; and monitors and reduces inequalities in outcomes.
Food choices affect both health and environmental sustainability. Many healthy dietary patterns, including those rich in fruit, vegetables, beans and pulses, can be affordable and support climate and sustainability goals.
This principle ensures that actions to improve diets also support affordability, environmental sustainability, local food systems and reduced food waste, whilst respecting personal, cultural and dietary preferences.
Eating behaviours are strongly shaped within households and family environments.
This principle means working with families as a whole, not just individuals; recognising the role of parents, carers, and wider household influences; designing interventions that fit family life, routines, and pressures; and supporting parents and carers as key role models for children.
Preventing poor diet and related health conditions is more effective and sustainable than treating them later.
This principle ensures a shift from reactive services to proactive prevention across the system.
Food and eating behaviours are deeply personal and often linked to stigma, particularly in relation to weight and poverty.
This principle ensures that all approaches avoid blame, shame, or stigma; respect individual circumstances and lived experience; focus on empowerment rather than judgement; and use person-centred and trauma-informed approaches.
People who experience barriers to eating well are best placed to shape solutions that work in real life.
This principle commits to codesigning services with communities, not for them; embedding lived experience in decision-making and governance; using co-production methods to shape programmes and interventions; and valuing local knowledge and insight.
Many people face everyday constraints that limit their ability to eat well, including food cost, time pressures, limited cooking facilities and transport and access issues.
This principle ensures that all interventions are realistic and achievable within people’s daily lives; focusing on affordability, convenience, and accessibility and offering practical support.
People often need support from multiple services, but fragmented systems can create barriers.
This principle ensures that services are joined up across organisations and sectors; providing seamless pathways between support offers; sharing information appropriately to avoid repetition; and linking eating well with wider needs such as mental health, housing and financial support.
