Our members form a global network and have created a dynamic forum to exchange views to support each other in our work.
We:
- Advocate at local, national, and international level to promote our purpose.
- Provide leadership and scholarship to strengthen the evidence base for effective action.
- Work to strengthen the capacity for action by working with partners to build the system and structure in which a well-trained workforce can operate. That includes:
- leading on workforce development in public health nutrition;
- running a professional certification scheme to assure competence and quality in public health nutrition practice; and
- promoting a course accreditation to assure the quality of training.
- Work with partners to support the effective development and delivery of policies and programmes that will promote better public health nutrition. Provide a forum for the discussion by running:
- an active website and newsletter;
- an international journal devoted to evidence-based discussion and debate;
- meetings, conferences and other related activities.
We affirm that good health is a human right, and we follow ethical principles, including those of transparency, equity and respect.
If you want to help us achieve our aims, become an active member.
Our overall purpose is to bring together people with a common interest in promoting and improving public health nutrition and to be a professional voice for public health nutrition internationally. We do that in order to:
- further the mission of public health nutrition, to prevent disease, and to promote well-being;
- build our professional capacity and to represent the interests of our and allied professions.
We recognise that better global well being will only be achieved by working in partnership with those committed to a population approach to the prevention of problems before they arise. With our members, we encourage policy-makers and decision takers, at all levels from global to local, to promote equitable and sustainable access to adequate, enjoyable, appropriate and nourishing food. This is essential for population health and well-being, and also for social, cultural and economic integrity, and to conserve the living and physical world.
As professionals, we need to be trained, mentored and supported throughout our careers. We work to ensure a well trained, resourced and organised profession, aware of the environmental, social, political and economic as well as the biological and personal determinants of disease, health and well-being, and what these imply for research, advocacy, policy, and action.
We are also committed to advocacy and action reliably based on evidence and protection of human rights. We work to ensure that in all possible circumstances, adequate nourishing food is available to and affordable by all.
The rules for governance of the association are outlined in th WPHNA Constitution.
The bodies of the Association are the Membership, the Executive Committee (EC) and Special Interest Groups (SIGs).
The Membership is the ultimate decision-making body of the Association, working through Special Interest Groups and consulted via surveys and webinars on key issues. Our members are from all continents and are committed to progressing with our mission.
The Executive Committee is composed of Association members elected by popular vote. Elected EC members exercise day-to-day responsibility for the work of the Association, with each EC member responsible for one core area of activity, as well as collectively being responsible for implementing the Annual Work Plan, then decisions of the EC and upholding the Constitution.
Each member of the EC is elected with a specific secretarial role as outline below. They are assisted by one or more Deputy Secretaries and member volunteers who express interest in joining the Secretariat Team.
President (2017 – present)
![[Photo of Margaret Miller]](/sites/default/files/inline-images/252159a3-472c-4309-9d0a-bb1b24bf3e19.jpg)
Current EC members:
General Secretary
Vacant
Treasurer
External Affairs Secretary
| Claudio Schuftan | Deputy: Maria Alvim |
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![[Photograph of Maria Alvim]](/sites/default/files/inline-images/foto_pro.jpg) |
Membership Secretary
Regional Secretary
|
(Africa Region) |
Duputy: Arezoo Rezazadeh (Asia Region) |
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Events Secretary
Vacant
Communications Secretary
| Carmen Levis | Christian Torres | Deputy: Margarita Otera Alvarez |
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Policy Secretary
| Angela Carriedo | Deputy: Elizabeth Sterken |
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Professional Affairs Secretary
Editor: World Nutrition
| Ted Greiner | Deputy Editor: Stanley IR Okoduwa |
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Early Career Secretary
| Deputy: Miranda Hendry | |
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![[Photo of Miranda Hendry]](/sites/default/files/inline-images/Miranda%20Hendry%20photo.jpg) |
Volunteer Coordinator
WPHNA was created at a critical time in history, when the need for collective action in the public interest is most urgent and pressing in order to promote and strengthen public health nutrition, as a profession and discipline with responsibility to understand, protect and improve nutrition-related population health and well-being.
The need for the Association was agreed at the first World Public Health Nutrition Congress held in Barcelona in 2006, when the first one hundred founder members from forty countries were nominated.
Formally incorporated and inaugurated in May 2008, the Association is currently a registered charity in the United Kingdom, and is affiliated with the International Union of Nutritional Sciences.
Our former governing body, the Association Council, was composed of:
Former President
(2015-2017)
Fabio Gomes
(2008 – 2015)
Barrie Margetts
Former Council Members (2008 – 2012)
Agneta Yngve
Carlos Monteiro
Fabio Gomes
Geoffrey Cannon
Harriet Kuhnlein
Maria Daniel Vaz de Almeida
Mark Lawrence
Nahla Hwalla
Philip James
Reggie Annan
Roger Hughes
Roger Shrimpton
Sabrina Ionata Granheim
Urban Jonsson