Health Policy Research
We're supporting healthier lives through actionable policy and behaviour change.
Growing sustainable fruit and vegetables for a healthy population (2020-2023)
Funded Period:
Sep 20 - May 23
Funder:
Industrial Strategy Challenge Fund (ISCF)/Innovate UK:
Value of Newcastle grant: £990,000
Lead Participant
Infarm - Indoor Urban Farming UK Limited
Participant
Marks and Spencer P.L.C., LONDON
Roboscientific Limited, Amersham
Newcastle University, United Kingdom
Summary:
Providing nutritious food for all in a resource and energy efficient manner is becoming increasingly challenging, particularly as our global population is expected to grow to 9.8Bn by 2050. Newcastle is the academic partner on a transformational project which aims to develop and optimise vertical farming systems to grow a wider variety of fruit and vegetables than is possible at present.
The project, "InFarm2.x: Data enabled vertical farming with minimal waste and emissions and maximum efficiency and crop nutrition", will optimise growing spaces to include additional gas sensors and monitoring cameras to allow growth cycles and changes to be monitored to varying crops to work out the perfect growing conditions as well as the pathogens to be monitored to optimise the perfect growing conditions for the crops.
For further information on the project please visit:
https://gtr.ukri.org/projects?ref=49078
Food fortification with vitamin D: Case study using eggs (2015-2021)
Funded Period:
May 19 - Dec 20
Funder:
Innovate UK
Value of Newcastle grant: £253,000
Lead Participant
Noble Foods Limited, Tring
Participant
RLC & RM HARBORD & son, Ross-On-Wye
Newcastle University, Newcastle Upon Tyne
Dsm Nutritional Products (UK) Limited, HEANOR
Summary:
Vitamin D deficiency is a significant public health issue in the UK with almost one in five adults having poor vitamin D status and most people failing to meet the Reference Nutrient Intake of 10µg/day. There is an urgent need to address poor population vitamin D status through the development of food-based strategies. Eggs can be enriched with vitamin D through manipulating vitamin D content in hens’ feed.
In 2015, an Innovate UK-funded Agri-Tech catalyst project (Project Code: 131899, https://gtr.ukri.org/projects?ref=131899) involving Newcastle University, DSM Nutritional Products and Noble Foods set out to investigate whether egg enrichment with vitamin D is commercially feasible, following enrichment of hen diets in accordance with EFSA safety limits on vitamin D. The research demonstrated that feeding flocks of commercial hens up to 75µg of 25-D/kg (25-hydroxyvitamin D3via Rovimix®Hy-D®) of feed for 6 weeks improved egg total vitamin D content by 40%. These results informed the reformulation of the UK’s leading free-range egg brand ‘Happy Egg’ in October 2018, offering vitamin D–enriched eggs to the consumer.
Following the initial exploitation of the Sunshine Eggs 1 project and the reformulation of Happy Egg, a second project, entitled Overcoming the barriers to maximise the commercial potential of vitamin D enriched eggs (Project Code: 133606, https://gtr.ukri.org/projects?ref=133606) or Sunshine Eggs 2, was initiated in 2018 with funding from Innovate UK under the Innovations in Health and Life Sciences call. This the aims of a second Innovate UK-funded Sunshine Eggs 2 project, which seeks to maximise the commercial potential of vitamin D–enriched eggs through several objectives. These relate to understanding (1) how storage/cooking methods affect egg vitamin D content; (2) whether enriched egg consumption improves vitamin D status in a human intervention trial; (3) consumer attitudes towards enriched eggs; and (4) market research to identify commercial opportunities for enriched eggs. The project seeks to drive fundamental impact across academic, commercial and public health nutrition sectors, in helping to offer viable vitamin D–enriched foods for UK consumers.
For more information please visit: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/nbu.12509
URB-HealthS
Principle investigator
Prof Tim Townshend, Prof of Urban Design for Health, Architecture, Planning, and Landscape.
Date
Jan to Dec 2020
Funder
EIT Health
Partner organisations:
- Universidad Politecnica de Madrid
- Fundación para la Investigación e Innovación Biomédica de Atención, Madrid
- Universidade de Coimbra
Summary
This health policy research brings together multidisciplinary experts. It aims to improve URBan Health training for current and future practitioners.
URB-HealthS explores the role of the built environment to enable healthier cities and behaviour change.
The key challenge of the project is to ensure actionable policy.
The Newcastle project focusses on Green Infrastructure for Health and Wellbeing.
Planning for Healthier Food Environments
Principle investigator
Prof Tim Townshend, Prof of Urban Design for Health, Architecture, Planning, and Landscape.
Date
June 2020 to Mar 2021
Funder
Public Health England
Summary
This health policy research aims to develop a continuing professional development training package. It is for local authority planning and public health teams.
The pack will support the implementation of PHE’s ‘healthy weight environments: using the planning system’ guidance. It will focus on the food environment.
Understanding barriers and opportunities within the planning appeal system to restrict hot food takeaway outlets
Co-investigator
Prof Tim Townshend, Prof of Urban Design for Health, Architecture, Planning, and Landscape.
Date
Feb to Dec 2020
Funder
NIHR School for Public Health Research
Lead
Prof. Amelia Lake, Teesside University
Summary
We investigate how hot food takeaway policy stands up through the appeals process.
The aim is to establish:
- why policies and guidance either stand or fail
- the future development of robust policy
Developing a Local Authority Research System: Middlesbrough Council, Redcar and Cleveland Borough Council, and Teesside University
Co-investigator
Prof Tim Townshend, Prof of Urban Design for Health, Architecture, Planning, and Landscape.
Date
Jun 2020 to Jan 2021
Lead
Prof. Dorothy Newbury-Birch, Teesside University
Summary
To explore how Middlesborough Council, Redcar and Cleveland Borough Council, and Teeside University expand their existing Memorandum of Understanding further to include other departments.
This will support the development of a research system. It will enable the authorities to become more active in public health and other areas.
Eliciting Preferences for Dental Care: an Application to NHS Dental Contract Reform
Principle investigator
Professor John Wildman, Professor of Health Economics, Population Health Sciences
Date
April 2020 to March 2023
Funder
NIHR
Summary
This project investigates contract reform in the dental sector. It is an NIHR funded PhD studentship. It will apply economic methods to understand preferences for dental care.