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FOOD FOR TALK presents... 

"Food Environments and Obesity - Neighbourhood or Nation?" 

Steven Cummins, MRC Fellow, Department of Geography, Queen Mary University 
of London; Visiting Scholar, School of Public Health, University of Michigan


Friday, April 7 
2:00-4:00, University of Toronto, University College Room 163 
   
Steven is a geographer with training in epidemiology and public health (PhD,

MRC Social & Public Health Sciences Unit, University of Glasgow, 2001; MSc 
in Epidemiology, London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, 2004). He has

held research posts in a variety of academic disciplines including public 
health, urban studies and geography, and is currently MRC Special Training 
Fellow in the Department of Geography at Queen Mary, University of London. 
He is also Visiting Fellow at the Center for Social Epidemiology & 
Population Health at the University of Michigan, where he is based until the

end of April 2006. 

In this talk, Dr. Cummins will be discussing the relation between
environments (broadly defined) and obesity.  Individually focused dietary
interventions attempting to reduce obesity have met with limited success,
with the rapid and widespread increasing prevalence of obesity only
partially explained by individual-level psychological and social factors
associated with diet. Such critiques have led to a new focus on the
'environmental' exposures that encourage excessive food intake and
discourage physical activity. Steve will survey the international evidence
on the effect of the neighbourhood 'food environment' on diet and attempt to
draw out some of the key trends, promises and pitfalls of current research
in this area from a variety of disciplinary perspectives. Aspects of these
trends will be illustrated by some of his recent work undertaken in the UK
and USA. 

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'Food for Talk' provides a place for conversations to take place between 
people who work with communities, government and universities to explore the

emerging and challenging issues around food security, agricultural 
transformation, and local food alternatives/networks.  This series is 
jointly sponsored by the Centre for Urban Health Initiatives, York 
University Faculty of Environmental Studies, the Ryerson Centre for Studies 
in Food Security, and the Toronto Food Policy Council. 

For more information about the seminar series, contact Joy Harewood 
[log in to unmask] or Lauren Baker [log in to unmask], or telephone the 
Centre for Urban Health Initiatives at 416-978-7223. 

Send the following text: unsubscribe click4hp to: [log in to unmask] if you wish to unsubscribe. Go to http://listserv.yorku.ca/archives/click4hp.html to view CLICK4HP archives or manage your subscription (you will have to create a password).