Benefits of membership

Our members benefit from collaboration characterised by access to: 

• exclusive publications, updates and events;
• dedicated time from nutrition scientists and education experts to support company needs and decision making;
• project consultancy with experienced in-house nutritionist scientists and education experts - to support activities such as devising, developing, and/or disseminating reviews of the evidence base; holding roundtables on specific topics; nutritional and dietary analyses; writing and editing; multi-media resource development; establishing nutrient criteria for product ranges; a sounding board for policy development and decision making; analysis of current diets (e.g. from national data); reviewing nutrition messages on websites; developing factsheets, FAQs, blogs and newsletters; and horizon scanning;
• training - a mix of face-to-face, webinar and online training vehicles, supporting in-house business needs, as well as staff wellbeing initiatives.

Eight key benefits of British Nutrition Foundation (BNF) corporate membership

1) Access to experts

• Qualified and experienced nutrition and education experts on hand – saving you time and money
• Provision of up-to-date and evidence based information, based on   the latest knowledge and thinking in nutrition science
• Support with reaching nutrition decisions based on breadth of available evidence
• Access to independent challenge and advice, and a sounding board for strategic planning, decision making and issues management

2)  Keeping up-to-date

• Exclusive access to member-only publications, such as Emerging Issues and Emerging Research
• Exclusive access to member-only events to discuss and advance nutrition issues
• Regular email alerts service on nutrition news and issues
• Complimentary copies of BNF publications, including Nutrition Bulletin
• Quarterly webinar updates
• Discounts on BNF publications, conferences and training

3) Consultancy

• Complimentary consultancy time allocation to support members on nutrition and health related matters
• Priority access for project work and meetings.
• Reduced rates for projects and additional consultancy – which can be commissioned at preferential rates (at least 40% reduction)

4) Networking

• Support with networking and professional linkages across diverse audiences
• Complimentary invitation to BNF Annual Day (providing a networking opportunity which incorporates the BNF Annual Lecture, Prize Giving and Annual Luncheon)

5) Training

• Access to nutrition training, helping to support your workforce’s professional development
• Support for staff wellbeing programmes
• Preferential rates for BNF online training courses (at least 40% reduction)
• Opportunity to commission bespoke training at preferential rates (at least 40% reduction)

6) Credibility

• Collaboration with an established, authoritative and evidence-based organisation, with strong governance in place to ensure robustness and integrity
• Membership acknowledged on the BNF website
• Opportunity to have links to BNF websites, e.g. external support, context and amplification for healthy eating information for consumers
• BNF’s insight , delivered by skilled staff and informed by in-depth interaction with a wide range of stakeholders

7) Amplifying

• Working collaboratively to amplify delivery of sound evidence-based nutrition science messages
• Media engagement assistance, via the BNF Press office
• Using your organisation’s own websites, activities, and external engagement to support BNF in delivering its vision and mission.

8) ESG

• Membership of BNF is a demonstration of your organisation’s commitment to advancing and improving the health of the UK population
• Intrinsic to membership is support of BNF’s key charitable objectives, e.g. schools-related work, media engagement, provision of information to the general public
• Opportunity to acknowledge BNF membership in communications with stakeholders and shareholders, e.g. via Annual Reviews, websites

Corporate members receive:

1) Publications

• Exclusive access to BNF’s quarterly horizon scanning e-newsletters on emerging issues (which provides a summary of recent developments relating to nutrition policy) and emerging research (which provides a summary of recent research across Europe and beyond that has the potential to influence nutritional policy and related legislation).
• Regular member alerts to priority items (including comment on new policy documents, research and reports on diet and health – benefiting from BNF’s wide network of contacts).
• Complimentary copies of all BNF publications, providing up to date reviews and comment on food, nutrition, physical activity and health.
• Free electronic access to Nutrition Bulletin (up to three people).
• Access to up-to-date information on nutrition and health, providing at a glance facts and figures on topical nutrition/ health subjects.
• Quarterly updates on BNF’s current and future activities, highlighting opportunities for collaboration.

2) Dedicated time

• Complimentary hours of consultancy per year, which can be used in a variety of ways, such as mini-projects, professional support, critical friend sessions, nutrition reviews, roundtable events and nutritional analyses.
• Additional complimentary consultancy time for email and telephone support on nutrition/health related matters that require minimal time to complete; further consultancy time can be purchased at preferential rates (saving at least 40% of standard rate).

 3) Networking and engagement

• Access to qualified nutrition scientists during working hours for day-to-day advice and information.
• Confidential ‘critical friend’ discussion on your nutrition work and strategy, supporting business decisions and direction.
• Automatic membership of BNF’s exclusive Members’ Forums (recent topics include biofortificiation, portion size, back to basics with healthy eating, sustainable diets, saturated fat).
• Links to BNF websites (www.nutrition.org.uk; www.foodafactoflife.org.uk) and inclusion in members list on BNF website and in BNF Annual Review.
• Complimentary invitation to BNF Annual Day (networking opportunity which incorporates the BNF Annual Lecture, Prize Giving and Annual Luncheon).
• Access to expertise in food and nutrition education in the UK.
• Access to preferential rates for BNF online training courses in nutrition and bespoke nutrition training packages.

4) Enhanced ESG credentials

Through membership, contribute to achieving BNF’s key charitable objects. This is used by some companies as an indicator of Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) commitments. Examples of BNF’s impact in 2018-2019:

• 2.79 million people visited our website www.nutrition.org.uk for evidence based nutrition information, an increase of 88% on the previous year;
• Our education website was used on 303,044 occasions, an increase of 35%;
• BNF was quoted on average 96 times per month in the media, up from 72 in 2017-2018;
• BNF Healthy Eating Week attracted registrations from 6,943 school and workplaces/universities (representing 3 million students and employees);
• Nutrition Bulletin was available in over 14,000 institutions worldwide, and 210,000 papers were downloaded (an increase of 19% on the previous year);
• 277 professionals attended our two high-profile conferences and a further 3,000 registered for our nutrition science webinars;
• We trained 139 teachers at events and a further 860 registered for education webinars.

For more details on the work of the BNF, click here.

5) Collaborative working opportunities

All members have the opportunity to commission projects on a consultancy basis (preferential rates – saving at least 40%), for example:

• support with developing nutrition criteria for product ranges that are compliant with legislation and UK government initiatives;
• constructive ‘critical friend’ challenge or sounding board, for example regarding product development, internal policy/ strategy and/or communication activities;
• analysis of current diets (e.g. from national data);
• reviewing nutrition messages, e.g. for websites, promotional material;
• developing factsheets, FAQs, blogs and newsletters
• identification of specific business-relevant emerging issues/ horizon scanning;
• support with tackling misrepresentation of science in the media;
• recipe and menu analysis using extensive food composition databases (e.g. for consumer communications, benchmarking purposes or to assess compliance with government initiatives);
• support with schools-related activities, e.g. developing or advising on content or positioning of resources;
• reviews of the scientific evidence underpinning specific topics of interest to particular members;
• support with day-to-day nutrition enquiries;
• support with networking;
• tailor-made training for staff and wellbeing initiatives.

The activities above could also utilise dedicated consultancy time provided as part of membership.

BNF Membership also supports delivery our charitable activities

Media engagement

• Work with journalists, providing iinterviews and quotes to set the record straight
• 24 hour media service, via email and telephone
• Providing responses to headlines in Nutrition Bulletin and on BNF website

External engagement

• Government
• Expert committees
• Research councils
• Professional bodies and learned societies
• Championing evidence-based nutrition science

Informing the public

• Evidence-based information provided via dedicated BNF website – www.nutrition.org.uk
• Email and telephone support

Research, academics and industry

• Dissemination of evidence based nutrition articles/papers via Nutrition Bulletin
• Task Force publications on topical issues
• Hosting and attending working groups on specific themes

Conferences and events

• Face-to-face events, such as workshops and conferences, which bring together a multidisciplinary audience

Training

• Online training, via our own dedicated platform – nutrition.training
• Webinars on topical issues

BNF Healthy Eating Week

• Open to all nursery, schools, workplaces and universities throughout the UK
• Exclusive resources to support healthy eating and key health challenges

Food – a fact of life (school education programme)

• Schools education advocacy
• Resources and materials via dedicated website – www.foodafactoflife.org.uk
• Teacher training