24/05/2012
Nestlé Equatorial Africa Region (EAR) yesterday announced the launch of its consumer awareness campaign whose objective is to educate the general public about nutrition, especially the impact of micronutrient deficiencies and lifestyle diseases on their general wellbeing. Dubbed “Listen to Your Body”, this nationwide campaign will also act as a call to action for individuals to start paying closer attention to their health and lifestyle choices.
Region Head and CEO of Nestlé Equatorial African Region, Pierre Trouilhat, said “As an initiative to generate awareness of common nutritional deficiencies and their related symptoms, Nestlé has embarked on this communication campaign to spread the message.”
He said that the “Listen To Your Body” campaign encourages consumers to be more attuned to their bodies, to understand fundamental signs and signals that the body may be providing from time to time. The campaign suggests a simple call to action, a simple everyday conversation that consumers can have with their bodies in order to better understand themselves and their health.
Today, Nestlé is not only the world’s leading food and beverage company; it is also increasingly recognized as the world’s leading nutrition, health and wellness company. This shows a clear commitment by our management to single-mindedly focus on providing solutions that improve the health and well-being of our consumers. And the reason is quite simple: we are not here to simply provide products for our consumers, but rather we make it our central mission to focus our efforts to combat the dual problem of malnutrition and obesity that prevails at an alarming rate across the globe” added Trouilhat.
Speaking at the same event, Ruth Oniang’o, Chairperson of the Food Security and Nutrition Thematic Working Group, Founder of Rural Outreach Program in Kenya and Member of the Nestlé Creating Shared Value Advisory Board, said that women and especially mothers are very key in the issue of nutrition because most of the time, it is them who make meal decisions in their homes. “Mothers and women guardians are key to this campaign and we want to encourage all mothers to use this campaign to make the nutrition change in their homes.”
“Listen to your body” campaign will target the general public, as an ongoing countrywide campaign. Billboards have already been erected in strategic locations around Nairobi. TV commercials have started featuring on local TV stations. As part of the engagement strategy, Nestlé will launch the Nutrimovil, a caravan that will go on a grassroots roadshow where people will get the opportunity to learn about the importance of nutrition in their lives and benefit from health checks. Leaflets with key nutritional information will also be distributed in strategic locations.
Phyllis Obote, Nutrition, Health and Wellness Manager at Nestlé EAR, said that Nestlé has a comprehensive nutrition strategy that focuses on balance, understanding and responsible pleasure in our products. Nestlé has internally developed a system to continuously monitor our existing product portfolio for their nutritional content with regards to the public health sensitive ingredients like salt, fats and sugars.
