Previous Task Forces
Food Based Dietary Guidelines Task Force
2015 – 2019
Dietary guidelines provide advice on foods, food groups, and dietary patterns to promote health, prevent chronic disease and ensure the public have a diet that provides the nutrients they require for health. Food based dietary guidelines establish a basis for public food and nutrition, health and agricultural policies and nutrition education programmes to encourage healthy eating habits and lifestyles.

Over the 4 years period of this Task Force ( 2015 – 2019) FENS had a series of activities around “food-based dietary guidelines” (FBDG), led by a FENS Task Force on FBDG. FENS hosted workshops on the topic in Brussels in 2017, Copenhagen in 2018 [1] and Bonn in 2019 [2].
Up till now, FBDG have been derived by using systematic reviews on diet-health relationships and translating dietary reference values for nutrient intake into foods. This approach does not consider many of the implications that dietary recommendations have on society, the economy and environment. Challenges including climate change and the burden of diet-related diseases mean that evidence-based findings from different dimensions need to be integrated into FBDG.
The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) has compiled a list of current Food Based Dietary Guidelines from over 100 of its member countries. More information and research about these guidelines can be found here