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SALT REDUCTION IN THE AMERICAS
Within the Americas, awareness of the association between salt and hypertension is mixed. However, strategies that focus on reducing discretionary salt usage through consumer-led initiatives seem to be a best buy.2,3 Within this consumer-led approach, a blanket strategy should be avoided, and careful attention should be given to the selection of specific behaviors, target group segmentation and research with the priority population.5,11 Social marketing, which uses marketing prin-
figure 1: Training and technical assistance activities roadmap
ciples to influence behavior to promote social good, encompasses the key components of a consumer-led approach.12 It considers the needs and wants of a group of people and then develops a program, policy or intervention that satisfies their wants and needs.12,13 Social marketing was selected as a strategy to combat excessive sodium consumption by the Pan American Health Organization for Latin America and the Caribbean.14 With funding from the International Development Research Centre, a project entitled ‘Scaling and evaluating policies and programs for the reduction of salt in Latin America’ was implemented between 2016 and 2019. This project brought together a broad-based coalition consisting of governmental agencies, nongovernmental organizations, researchers, public health practitioners and regional stakeholders from four countries in Latin America (Brazil, Costa Rica, Paraguay and Peru), along with the University of South Florida and the World Health Organization Collaborating Center on Social Marketing and Social Change (USF WHO CC). The USF WHO CC designed and implemented a series of training and technical assistance activities to support the research teams from the four countries in developing a social marketing strategy to tackle excessive salt consumption in their local context (Figure 1). The information that follows highlights the steps of the process that the WHO CC used, along with some of the key deliverables from the process. Building capacity Building capacity among community researchers and practitioners on how to use social marketing to promote positive behavior change is likely to produce more effective campaigns than more traditional ‘top-down’ or ‘expert-led’ interventions. As a result, the initial phases of the project consisted of building up the skills of the country partners in understanding social marketing and applying what they learned to salt reduction efforts. We accomplished this by developing and implementing a virtual, online course on social marketing, coupled with an in-person workshop. The course consisted of eight online modules, and participants met with researchers at the USF WHO CC biweekly to identify barriers to salt reduction, population segments and initial methods for formative research.
“Building social marketing
© Silvia Sommariva
capacity is likely to produce more effective campaigns than more traditional ‘top-down’ or ‘expert-led’ interventions”
