CERI expands to nine Centres of Research Excellence

The Centre of Research Excellence: Healthy Food, Healthy Planet, Healthy People is the latest CRE to join the collaboration, which brings organisations together to find alignment in the policy and practice implications of their work.

Led by Professor Simone Pettigrew, Program Lead, Food Policy at The George Institute for Global Health, this new CRE will deliver world-leading innovations in nutrient profiling algorithms and environmental indicators that estimate the human and planetary consequences of varying patterns of food and beverage consumption.

The Healthy Food, Healthy Planet, Healthy People CRE will:

• Identify effective means of conveying combined nutrition and sustainability information
• Use the developed algorithms, environmental indicators and user response data to model the impact of various policy options on human and planetary health outcomes
• Develop evidence-based recommendations for government-led and market-based strategies to improve the nutritional quality and sustainability of the food supply
• Work with consumers, industry and government to accelerate uptake of the research findings.

Food is the single biggest issue for health on the planet. This CRE is contributing critical evidence for consumers on what is healthy for themselves, their families and the planet.

Professor Simone Pettigrew

CERI was formed in 2020 to enhance the impact, profile and value-add of prevention research in Australia through expanded multi-centre collaboration and networking.

It has developed a series of joint narratives and stories about prevention, a User Guide on knowledge translation and science communication for CREs working in prevention, and a number of submissions to Government.

A major focus of CERI is on shared capacity building for Australia’s future prevention workforce.

Early to mid-career researchers from the participating centres have the opportunity to attend regular seminars and networking events, receive communications support, and work together to synthesise knowledge across the centres for policy.

A national Emerging Leaders symposium is planned for July, offering a full day of facilitated networking and interactive online sessions around perspectives on systems impact on chronic disease prevention.

Prevention Centre Co-Director Professor Lucie Rychetnik said CERI was evolving into a force for prevention that could present a united voice on issues such as equity, implementation, research capacity and making the case for prevention.

“The fact that we are working together collaboratively through CERI is a real strength for prevention research in Australia,” Professor Rychetnik said.

About CERI

The Collaboration for Enhanced Research Impact (CERI) is a joint initiative between the Prevention Centre and several NHMRC Centres of Research Excellence, established in June 2020 to enhance the profile and impact of chronic disease prevention in Australia. We are working together to find alignment in the policy and practice implications of our work and to develop shared communications across our various projects and participating centres.

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