About the Breakfast is Best Campaign

Although the idea of breakfast being the most important meal of the day is widely known and understood, many Europeans fail to act on this knowledge. This is why the European Breakfast Cereal Association (CEEREAL) representing the European breakfast cereal and oat milling industries joined forces with like-minded health organisations such as the European Medical Association (EMA), the European Federation of the Associations of Dietitians (EFAD) and the European Club of Paediatric Dietitians/le Club Européen des Diététiciens de l’Enfance (CEDE) to launch the science-based “Breakfast is Best” campaign in 2008.

The purpose of our coalition is to significantly increase awareness among European and national level decision makers about the importance of breakfast and ensure that the message “breakfast is the most important meal of the day” is as well understood and acted upon as the advice to “eat five portions of fruit and vegetables per day”.

In so doing the campaign aims to highlight the positive impact of breakfast in four key areas:

In helping to prevent obesity
As an aid to improve general health
Maintain cognitive performance and concentration
Provide the body with the energy it needs to kick-start metabolism

The Breakfast is Best campaign calls on policymakers to include the importance of breakfast in dietary recommendations and to monitor breakfast consumption as a key health indicator. More specifically the campaign urges the European Union and Member States to:

Include “eat breakfast every day” in public health information campaigns
Have “eat breakfast every day” added to all lists of standard nutrition advice tips
Include the importance of breakfast in school curricula
Encourage public-private partnerships, employers and civil society to promote breakfast in the workplace, in schools and at home

Together with a wide range of multi-stakeholder supporters from across Europe, we call on European leaders to put breakfast at the heart of public health promotion campaigns and encourage Europeans to “Make Time for Breakfast” as a significant but achievable step towards achieving healthier lifestyles. In order to achieve this, we have set some clear objectives:

Ensuring that, by 2020, all EU countries include the importance of eating breakfast in their nutrition policies, and monitor breakfast consumption as a key health indicator;
“Eat breakfast everyday” is added to standard nutrition advice and the importance of breakfast is included in school curricula and employee health initiatives;
The WHO/Europe “Health 2020 strategy” and EU actions on health inequalities reflect the importance of eating breakfast for long-term health outcomes.

As an active member since its launch in 2008, EFAD supports BIB because it recognises breakfast is an important opportunity to improve nutrient intake for people of all ages. According to Judith Liddell, Secretary General of EFAD, “Skipping breakfast tends to cause people to snack (possibly unhealthily) mid-morning, so there are definite benefits to eating something over nothing in the morning. Ideally people should eat a breakfast containing a balance of food groups including fruit, fibre, dairy and other traditional breakfast foods. Regularly eating a healthy breakfast can reduce the risk of becoming obese which can lead to diabetes and high blood pressure.” She continues, “the Breakfast is Best initiative is the only EU campaign that promotes breakfast as a contributor to public health both to the public and, just as importantly, to policymakers.”

As part of its engagement programme, the Breakfast is Best campaign launched a “Make Time for Breakfast Pledge” initiative, gathering support and signatures from healthcare professionals, to policymakers, to the general public from around the world, driving awareness on the benefits of breakfast as a tool to address health challenges in the 21st century.

Contact

For further information on the Breakfast is Best initiative, visit www.breakfastisbest.eu and our pledge page www.breakfastisbest.eu/pledge, follow us on Twitter @BreakfastIsBest, or write us at info@breakfastisbest.eu.