What we're doing

The Healthy Borough Programme takes a whole systems approach to tackling the environmental causes of obesity. This means that the programme doesn’t just focus on one area for improvement but rather looks at all the potential barriers to a healthier lifestyle and works to overcome them. The programme focuses on the wider social, cultural and environmental factors that influence lifestyles.

As such, improving the local environment is central to the programme’s implementation including the built environment, the design and delivery of services and the availability of healthy food options. The programme is built around three overarching themes:

• Healthy environments
• Healthy organisations
• Healthy communities

The Healthy Borough Programme focuses primarily on children and families but the wider community will also benefit through initiatives aimed at organisations and workplaces.

These themes are linked by three cross cutting strands:

• Active Travel – which aims to promote walking and cycling through improving walking and cycling routes, providing incentives through organisational policies and plans and equipping local people with skills, confidence and opportunities.
• Active Lives – which aims to promote physical activity as a part of everyday life in parks and open spaces, housing estates, leisure and community centres and organisational settings, including active play, dancing, swimming and sports.
• Healthy Food – which aims to improve access to healthier food options in the local community and organisations and, where possible, reduce the availability of foods that are high in fat, sugar and salt.

Within these strands there are 15 projects that make up the core of the Healthy Borough Programme but the programme also aims to achieve a wider impact on the environment, partner organisations and the wider community beyond these core projects.

Download the Quick Guide to Tower Hamlets' Healthy Borough Programme.