CoE-FS Nutrition Lead Professor Rina Swart delivers her powerful inaugural lecture.
On 7 August 2025, our Principal Investigator and Nutrition Lead Professor Rina Swart, veteran public health nutritionist, educator, and researcher, delivered her inaugural lecture at the University of the Western Cape (UWC), where she has spent over 35 years shaping the field of dietetics. Titled: “Enabling Food Environments to Address the Triple Burden of Malnutrition”. The lecture provided both a personal and scientific reflection on her academic journey, the major milestones in South African nutrition policy, and the critical challenges still facing our food system. Professor Swart grounded her message in three core truths:
“The quality of diets of the average South African is poor; our food choices and dietary quality are not necessarily our own free choices, but are manipulated through marketing; and there are policy actions that can and must be implemented.”
These, she argued, are “critical obligations for duty bearers to balance the scale.”
A Legacy Rooted in Service and Transformation
Prof Swart opened her lecture with a warm acknowledgement of her personal and academic roots.
“I want to thank UWC for being my home for 35 years, and to celebrate the students we have produced—close to 700 dietetics graduates, who are now making an immense impact on the demographics and direction of the profession in South Africa. I’m proud of every single one.”
From her first major research project—the 1999 National Food Consumption Survey, which laid the groundwork for mandatory food fortification in South Africa—to her leadership of the Nutrition Programme within the CoE-FS since 2014, Prof Swart has consistently worked to build an evidence base that drives real systemic change.
Diagnosing a Broken Food System
Professor Swart’s lecture painted a sobering picture of South Africa’s nutritional landscape: Three out of ten children remain stunted, a figure that has remained largely unchanged for years.
“Stunting is the result of long-term, sometimes marginal undernutrition. It affects growth, disease risk, mortality, mental capacity, and even a child’s future income-generating potential.”
She drew powerful links between persistent undernutrition, the rise in obesity and non-communicable diseases, and a food system saturated with ultra-processed, aggressively marketed products and offered the following reflection:
“Since the late 1960s, we’ve seen an explosion in food marketing and processing. Many foods today contain ingredients we cannot even identify—yet they’re loaded with sugar, salt, and unhealthy fats. One striking data point: between 1997 and 2020, South Africans’ daily intake of sugar-sweetened beverages surged to nearly one glass per person per day. Something must be wrong with the food system when we export food, yet children in our country are malnourished and not achieving their potential.”
Manipulated Choices and the Illusion of Agency
Central to Professor Swart’s argument was the idea that food choice is not as free as it seems. Her research reveals that the poorest-quality cereals, those highest in sugar and salt are also the most aggressively marketed, particularly to children.
“We assessed food advertisements and found a clear pattern: the worse the product, the heavier the marketing. Children are the key audience.”
A Constitutional Duty to Act
Swart’s third key message was an urgent call to action. “Policy interventions are not about creating a nanny state,” she stressed. “They are about fulfilling constitutional obligations—like Section 28, which guarantees every child the right to adequate nutrition.”
Highlighting the Health Promotion Levy, she noted its success in reducing sugar consumption and shifting beverage choices, and called for it to be strengthened.
“The levy worked. The data is clear. It’s time to increase it.”
Swart also presented evidence from consumer studies showing strong public preference for warning labels on unhealthy foods, underscoring the public’s appetite for transparency and support in making healthier choices.
“Research That Makes Us Angry – and Then Makes Us Act”
In response, CoE-FS Director Professor Julian May praised Swart for a lecture that bridged science and social justice and offered the following;
“Rina’s work makes us ask: Why? Why are we still in this urgent food security crisis? It’s fitting that this work was done here at UWC, a public institution embedded in the communities we serve.”
Professor May highlighted how Swart’s data-rich presentation made abstract statistics tangible, and transformed them into a call for policy, advocacy, and action and commented;
“She showed us that people are being manipulated—but that the more information we have, the more agency we gain.”
A Call to the Food Justice Community
Professor Swart’s closing message was clear and bold:
“We must ensure that our food system contributes to justice, health, and dignity. Whether through advocacy, research, or policy reform, we all have a role to play.”
At a time when nutrition-related diseases continue to climb and food systems become more commercialised and inequitable, Prof Rina Swart’s inaugural lecture was more than a personal milestone. It was a challenge to all of us; researchers, policymakers, educators, and citizens, to make better use of evidence, demand better systems, and work toward food justice in South Africa.
