A Pilot Study to Examine the Effects of a School-Based Intervention for Promoting Food and Nutrition Literacy (FNLIT) in Romanian School Children

Abstract

The prevalence of Non-Communicable Diseases (NCDs) is an important public health problem in Romania, where, nutrition transition has taken place and has resulted in a more westernized dietary pattern, especially among children and adolescents. WHO has identified schools as the ideal place to educate children and adolescents efficiently in Food and Nutrition Literacy (FNLIT). The present research consisted of a pilot study to determine the effectiveness of a nutrition education programme implemented among lower secondary school children by investigating whether students tended to score higher in several FNLIT domains at post-test compared to the pre-test average. The implementation of the intervention consisted of five lessons in online or physical classes. Even if the intervention period had a relatively short period of implementation improvements in understanding, interactive food and nutrition literacy, critical food and label literacy were observed. Future research should focus on expanding the intervention in other schools.