Eating at worksites in Nordic countries: National experiences and policy initiatives

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to review national experiences and policy initiatives within worksite eating in four Nordic countries, in order to compare the experiences and identify important lessons and needs for future research, experiments and governmental regulation.

Design/methodology/approach – The paper is based on national reviews of analyses of worksite eating and initiatives regarding policy, research and experiments in relation to worksite eating. The national experiences are compared.

Findings – The paper shows awareness in all four countries about the role of the worksite in the shaping of dietary habits of the employees and some experiments with healthier worksite eating schemes. Blue-collar employees, employees with working hours outside normal working hours and employees with shifting worksites are likely to be offered less organised and less healthy food
schemes. Worksites’ experiments with healthier worksite eating schemes based on employee participation can change worksite eating substantially, including at blue-collar worksites. However, the generalising of findings to other worksites not participating in the experiments seems limited. There is need for more research in the embedding of experiments.

Originality/value – The paper has value as the first cross-national review covering four of the Nordic countries in the area of worksite eating and attempts to create healthier worksite eating. By combining research findings and policy initiatives from four countries, the paper gives access to a big pool of knowledge, which can inspire future research and policy initiatives, including future experiments and future governmental regulation.

Keywords Diet, Workplace, Denmark, Finland, Norway, Sweden