The Chellaram Programme for Healthy and Sustainable Diets will bring together researchers from the Nuffield Department of Primary Care Health Sciences, the Oxford Martin School, the Department of Biology and the School of Geography and the Environment. The programme has been established through a £5 million philanthropic gift from the Chellaram Foundation.
Alongside the research activity, the programme will support doctoral students and early-career researchers through the Chellaram Scholars Programme. A dedicated public and policy engagement work strand will help ensure findings are shared with policymakers, practitioners, industry, civil society and the wider public. This will ensure that the people with power to make change have the latest evidence from the programme to guide them, and that the findings have a wide influence on society.
The programme launches at a time of growing international focus on the links between diet, chronic disease, climate change, biodiversity loss and animal welfare. While there is increasing evidence that a shift towards more plant-rich diets could bring benefits across these areas, there are major questions remaining about how these changes can be achieved in ways that are effective, equitable and acceptable to the public.