International visitors learn about school lunches in Joensuu

Famed North Karelia Project continues to attract foreign observers

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City councillor Ron Gould from Liverpool samples a piece of baguette baked by eight-graders in their domestic science class in the Pielisjoki School in Joensuu on Thursday.
      "That's good", he says and continues: "Our school food is so unhealthy. People no longer know how to cook food at home. Fast food has completely taken over."
      A group of forty international observers has just turned up in the school's home economics classroom to learn about the Finnish way of teaching children about the housekeeping basics, including cooking healthy meals.
     
The international visitors have arrived in Finland to familiarise themselves with the North Karelia Project, a massive health awareness effort commenced in 1972, which succeeded in changing dietary habits in the region of North Karelia, and in reducing the region's towering mortality rate from coronary heart disease by as much as 75 percent.
      The 25-year project managed to add seven years to the life expectancy of men in the area and six years to that of women.
      The project itself was wound up eight years ago, but its far-reaching health effects continue to attract health care officials and political decision-makers from around the world.
     
"A long time ago, the number of international visitors grew beyond our capacity to receive them all. With the World Health Organisation, we agreed to take observers twice a year", explains Director General of the National Public Health Institute Pekka Puska, the initiator of the original project.
      In Joensuu, the provincial capital of North Karelia, Puska is still remembered as the authority who changed the destiny of thousands of people by introducing them to healthier eating habits.
      "In the late 1970s we had an enormous battle to replace butter with margarine and whole milk with skimmed milk", he explains to the tour party. Then he stops abruptly: "Oh. Hey, this is an important spot. Right here there used to be a soft drink vending machine. It was removed by a decision of the students' union when term started this autumn", Puska says.
     
This time, his listeners consisted of guests from Great Britain, Canada, Russia, China, Iran, and Tunisia.
      The visitors were particularly interested in Finnish school lunches, home economics education, and the multi-disciplinary cooperation in conjunction with the North Karelia Project.
      They also familiarised themselves with today's health education work, which in Joensuu is carried out by the successor of the North Karelia Project, the North Karelia National Public Health Centre.
     
In Russian Karelia, across the border, the public health situation is somewhat similar to that of North Karelia 30 years ago.
      With help from Finland, the health work there is off to a good start. "But it is a struggle. People are unwilling to exercise and they drink too much vodka". physician-in-chief Gennadi Batskojev from the Aunus Hospital explains.
     
In Liverpool, a health campaign called "Heart of Mersey" has been modelled after the North Karelia Project.
      The head of the project, Robin Ireland, lists promoting quitting smoking and adopting healthier eating habits as the main objectives of the campaign.
      Prompted by the celebrity chef Jamie Oliver, the whole of Great Britain is currently discussing ways of improving the quality of school meals.
     
In the Pielisjoki School the international guests also had a chance to enjoy a famous Finnish school lunch.
      They were in luck, for the Wednesday menu consisted of the pupils' favourite - mashed potatoes, salad, and "French fish", in other words, gratinated Norwegian coalfish.


Previously in HS International Edition:
  British MPs come to Finland to learn about preventing obesity (17.2.2004)
  In the fight against obesity, Brits modelling themselves on slenderer Finns (13.1.2004)
  Best topic of the summer: Finnish food (23.8.2005)
  Helsinki schools' vending machines for sweets and soft drinks to be switched off during lunch break (25.2.2004)

Links:
  National Public Health Institute: The North Karelia Project
  CVHP Institute: The North Karelia Project
  Heart of Mersey

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