The best ingredient in a healthy life is good, fresh information.
This section is a portal that will take you into the world of information about how to eat healthy and live actively in fun and meaningful ways. It includes everything from strategies to create a healthy eating and living plan, to information about organizations that are promoting healthy living. There are resources to help you find fun activities to do alone or with friends and family, and great information about nutrition.
What follows are tidbits of what you’ll find in the guide or site, then a link to more. It’s food for the brain to help you live the happiest, healthiest life possible.
- Health Canada’s Guide to Food and Nutrition provides information on food safety and nutrition. Maintaining the safety of Canada’s food supply is a shared responsibility among government, industry and consumers. Eating a nutritious and balanced diet is one of the best ways to protect and promote good health. This site also provides links to information on Canada’s Food Guide, nutrition labeling, bottled water, chemical contaminants and food allergies.
- Dietitian Services at Healthlink BC offers easy-to-use quality food and nutrition information and resources for good self-care. The website also provides a toll-free number for a personal, confidential consultation with a registered dietitian. Connect with a Registered Dietitian at HealthLink BC by dialing 8-1-1, or sending an email.
- The Childhood Obesity Foundation is a Canadian registered charity and a leading Canadian authority on issues related to childhood obesity. The Foundation’s mission is to identify, evaluate, and promote best practices in healthy nutrition and physical activity to reduce the prevalence of childhood obesity. The Childhood Obesity Foundation’s website includes a list of childhood healthy weights programs and resources available in Canada, including the ShapedownBC program. On the website you will also find information for families, schools, communities and health care professionals related to childhood healthy weights.
- The Senior Chef: Cooking for One or Two is a free recipe book for seniors. This handy book has practical nutrition and cooking information for seniors and a lot of good, simple recipes. You will find the whys and hows of planning the kinds of meals you need to develop and maintain good health.
- The Healthy Families BC website provides a wide range of helpful information on active living, healthy eating and maintaining a healthy weight.
- The Air Quality Health Index reports that the average person takes about 20,000 breaths a day, which means an amazing 10,000 litres of air passes pass through your lungs every 24 hours. The site provides daily reports on air quality in communities throughout BC.
- The Canadian Cancer Society (BC/Yukon) website provides useful information on the role healthy eating and physical activity can play in preventing cancer.
- The Heart and Stroke Foundation website provides a range of helpful information on healthy eating and active living and useful tools for assessing your health risk like a personalized blood pressure action plan.
- Healthy Eating: Cheap and Easy is about how eating healthy is the best thing you can do for you and your family every day. When you eat well, you feel better, have more energy, and lower your risk of heart disease, diabetes and some types of cancer. Many healthy foods like breads, cereals, fruits and vegetables cost less than other foods like chips and pop. So you can eat well without spending a lot of money or a lot of time. The booklet covers the basics of planning meals, shopping and preparing foods — also listing places where you can find good recipes.
- The Heart and Stroke Foundation’s Healthy You, Healthy Weight offers an encouraging, realistic, 6-step weight loss plan that takes you from assessing yourself to setting goals to getting fit.
- Healthy Eating for Seniors (available in English, Chinese and Punjabi) is an interesting, informative and useful resource that includes information about what food and supplements are most important, gives tips on how to prevent or manage common chronic diseases, provides simple advice on ways to eat with less salt and fat and advice how to read labels among other things. Seniors and dieticians from across BC share tips and recipes.
- The Healthy Living For Families booklets are designed to help you make smart healthy choices, with tips on everything from healthy eating on the run to being active together as a family. Inside you’ll also find some guidelines on things like choosing healthier foods and balancing different kinds of physical activity. The booklet series is available in 6 different languages. Tips are all age appropriate!
- Health Canada’s Office of Nutrition Policy and Promotion serves as a focal point and authoritative source for nutrition and healthy eating policy and promotion in Health Canada. The Office of Nutrition and Promotion defines, promotes and implement evidence-based nutrition policies.
- The BC Ministry of Health produces a Healthy Snack for Adults guide in a number of different languages. Check their website to find your language of choice.
- The Dietitians of Canada site includes detailed information about nutrition and also tools to help easily create and track a healthy diet.
- Healthy Eating At School is aimed at encouraging healthy eating at school. It is a partnership between BC Dairy Foundation, B.C. Government and Knowledge: (formerly Knowledge Network). The website provides school communities with all the resources they need to implement nutrition policy at school.
Please Note: The information sources and links contained on this website do not necessarily reflect the views of the sponsors of this website and are provided for information only.