Melissa Vargas (Expert on nutrition guidelines and standards/project coordinator, FAO), talks you about what aspects shape consumers food related behaviours and what interventions and approaches have been used to influence such behaviours for positive outcomes on diets and nutrition.

She comes back on a comprehensive picture of all factors that influence food related behaviours and insists on the fact that simple information dissemination can not tackle all of these levels and factors. More and more, researchers and practitioners are acknowledging the complexity of consumer behaviour. However, in many occasions, this acknowledgement is not adequately translated into consumer research, interventions and evaluations.

Some approaches have shown positive results and some others that seem promising but require more research. Among them, financial measures, taxes systems, nudging strategies, or measures ranging from information dissemination and communication campaigns with the aim to raise awareness, and also  examples of positive influencers.

Melissa also notes that significant challenges remain, that impair large-scale and maintainable gains from consumer activism, including common shortcomings of collective action.