Navigating narratives toward the health-sustainability nexus : Oslo's prescriptions for healthy and sustainable diets

Abstract

Unhealthy diets are the leading risk factor for deaths worldwide, and food systems pressure Earth system processes past their planetary boundaries. Research calls for transformational change toward healthy and sustainable diets. Yet, messages in Oslo’s foodscape dissonantly prescribe diets for health and sustainability. From the perspectives of social practice theory, discourse analysis, and transformational change, messages matter: they can affect meanings around food and, indirectly, dietary practices.

This thesis asks, “What prescriptions and claims for healthy and sustainable diets are purported in Oslo’s foodscape, and what concepts and sources are they based on?” Actor mapping, interviews, and discourse analysis revealed actors and their messages, sources, and underlying concepts. The messages direct a change in dietary practices on six levels, and their sources range in proximity to scientific theorizing. The actors’ concepts of health and sustainability were conflated, narrow, and obscured. This confusion manifested in binary framing of a complex problem, which restricted discussion of tradeoffs and synergies within and between the dimensions of health and sustainability. In response, I explore a framework for the health-sustainability nexus that accommodates a diverse discourse, creating space for productive discussion.

The Nordic Nutrition Recommendations (NNR) are the basis for Nordic food-based dietary guidelines (FBDGs). The next edition aims to include sustainability in the analysis. To direct their next update, I suggest that the NNR Committee use a framework for the health-sustainability nexus, like the one explored here, alongside concepts of transformational change. As public messages, the resulting FBDGs could more clearly direct diets toward health and sustainability in the Nordics, including Oslo.