Local food environments: Australian stakeholder perspectives on urban planning and governance to advance health and equity within cities

ABSTRACT

Urban planning policy has the potential to improve population health outcomes and reduce health inequities within cities. In Australia, however, the pathways for implementing policy approaches are unclear, and responsibilities are contested and dispersed across sectors, portfolios and levels of government. This study investigated government, non-government and private sector perspectives on spatial planning for local food environments and aimed to identify governance opportunities to advance healthy equitable food access. Informed by health governance frameworks, 27 key informant interviews with policymakers and practitioners from urban planning, public health, urban economic and partnership development were conducted in Melbourne, Australia, a city experiencing rapid growth. Stakeholders identified regulation, urban planning policy, finance, coordination and partnerships as key governance processes for the creation of healthy food environments; political leadership as a driver for action; and distributed leadership as essential for implementation. Urban health is a recurring theme in the UN Sustainable Development Goals with targets for health and wellbeing, and sustainable urbanisation. Our study contributes to an understanding of the governance actions required to deliver healthy equitable urban food environments, and demonstrates the importance of comprehensive action, particularly when two of the potentially most powerful levers, regulation and finance, are weak.

KEYWORDS:

• Local food environment
• urban health
• health equity
• urban planning policy
• governance

View addendum:

City Know-how

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the (Australian) National Health and Medical Research Council under the Centre for Research Excellence in Healthy Liveable Communities [grant number 1061404]; MM is supported by the Australian Government Research Training Program Scholarship; HB is supported by a RMIT University Vice Chancellor’s Fellowship and BGC is supported by a National Health and Medical Research Council Senior Principal Research Fellowship [grant number 1107672].

Notes on contributors

Maureen Murphy

Maureen Murphy is a PhD candidate, Centre for Health Equity, The University of Melbourne.

Helen Jordan

Helen Jordan, PhD, is a senior lecturer, Centre for Health Policy, The University of Melbourne.

Hannah Badland

Hannah Badland, Ph.D., is a principal research fellow, Healthy Liveable Cities Group, Centre for Urban Research, RMIT University, Melbourne, Australia.

Billie Giles-Corti

Billie Giles-Corti is the director of the Healthy Liveable Cities Group, Centre for Urban Research, RMIT University, Melbourne, Australia.