Wendy Watson

Wendy Watson was Senior Nutrition Project Officer at Cancer Council NSW, working to promote healthy lifestyles and creating an environment that supports and encourages Australians to make healthy choices to reduce their cancer risk.

Wendy carries out strategic research and advocacy on food policy, food labelling and food marketing to children.

Wendy has a degree in Chemistry and a Masters of Applied Science in Nutrition. She worked for five years supporting schools to implement the NSW Healthy School Canteen Strategy before joining Cancer Council NSW in 2010.

Wendy and her team of dietitians and nutritionists are responsible for the organisation’s cancer prevention projects relating to obesity, nutrition, physical activity and alcohol. These include the Healthy Lunchbox website promoting healthy eating, as well as strategic research and advocacy into food labelling and food marketing to children.

Wendy also contributes to Cancer Council Australia’s advocacy on nutrition, food labelling and food policy.

She has published on food labelling and food marketing to children. Wendy has a degree in Chemistry and a Masters of Applied Science in Nutrition. She worked for five years supporting schools to implement the NSW Healthy School Canteen Strategy before joining Cancer Council NSW in 2010.

Recent articles by Wendy Watson

We need action on unhealthy food marketing – and the community agrees

Unhealthy food marketing is pervasive . Find out what the NSW community thinks the government should do to help.

Kids bombarded by unhealthy advertising messages

Bus with junk food messaging

A recent audit of Sydney buses found 83% of food ads were for unhealthy food.

Food and advertising industry failing to protect children from junk food marketing

A new study has looked into the effectiveness of current food criteria and definitions of ‘unhealthy food’.

How the Health Star Rating system started

Assortment of different food labels

Cancer Council has been at the forefront of developing a national food labelling system.

Food and mood: what we eat affects our mental health

Eating a healthy diet can prevent cancer, but did you know that it can improve our mental health?

How do your drinks stack up?

How much sugar is in your favourite drinks? Many tend to have a lot of kilojoules and sugar which make you thirstier and are bad for the teeth.

The next step in tackling childhood obesity: removing junk food advertising from the school trip

Each month children under the age of 15 in NSW make over 3.3 million bus trips and over 2 million train trips, and we know there are alarming numbers of junk food ads all around. We carried out a survey around Sydney schools to find out how many junk food ads kids are exposed to […]

What the surveys are showing about kids (unhealthy) lifestyles

Our busy lifestyles, rushing to and from work and school, can make it hard to eat a healthy diet and to get enough exercise. It often seems like the easy option to choose unhealthy snacks and takeaway foods and spend too much time in front of the TV or computer. But these choices are not […]

Fussy eating

Is your child a fussy eater? Does this cause you a lot of stress at mealtimes? You are not alone! Feeding children can feel like a struggle at times. However, a helpful concept to consider is ‘parents provide, children decide’, where your job is to provide the healthy food, and it’s your child’s job to […]

How healthy are your kids’ snacks?

What kids eat is so important for healthy growth and development. However, many children’s diets are falling well short of recommendations with many typically eating too many unhealthy foods and too few foods they need for healthy growth, especially teenagers. Did you know? Nearly one in two children regularly drink sugary drinks Half of children […]