Sixth plenary meeting of the European Alcohol and health Forum

Short summary:

1. Welcome

2. Procedural Issues

The Forum was informed that

• A common annual system of monitoring is now replacing the initial ad hoc system.
• Deadline for submitting monitoring reports for the 2010 process: end April 2010
• The Chair announced that 2 Members (ReLeaf and the Finnish Hospitality Association) would now be suspended and a further 6 (Royal Ahold, ECYC, FEANTSA, FAEP, British Retail Consortium, ETUC) have until the end of May to introduce a commitment, following which they will also be suspended.

3. Open Alcohol Forum

4. Science Group

• The Chair noted that healthy workforce occupies an important position in the recently presented Europe 2020 strategy and is an issue of strategic importance for the Commission and for Commissioner Dalli. He then opened the floor for discussion.
• Points made by the Forum participants included:

1. The complexity of topic (alcohol and the workplace) was highlighted. For example, it is not just a question of alcohol consumption's impact on productivity, but also that the workplace as a setting for alcohol consumption can have an impact on life beyond the workplace (e.g. journeys home)
2. There was an interest among Forum members to develop information relating to effectiveness of workplace-based activities. The focus should be on the workplace as a setting for harm prevention and health promotion rather than on wider alcohol policies and their relevance to workplaces.
3. It was highlighted that considerable work has already been done to develop interventions and workplace alcohol policies. Reports on evaluated interventions may be hard to find due to language barriers and because alcohol issues may be addressed under broader health promotion or mental health titles. There may be a lack of interventions suitable for small and medium-sized enterprises.

• The Chair concluded:

1. A minimum a scan of current knowledge, including an update of the national baselines in Member States, was needed.
2. The task request for the Science Group will be reformulated to address current knowledge on the situation across the EU, picking up differences between large enterprises and SMEs, between sectors and Member States, and including evidence of effectiveness of workplace interventions.
3. The Science Group will be requested to give pointers as to opportunities for action and for additional data gathering. The reformulated task will be circulated to Forum members for comments before being finalised by the Chair.

5. Presentation on the Campaign for Smarter Drinking: Elizabeth Crossick and Richard Evans presented the Campaign for Smarter Drinking, a £100 million industry initiative to promote responsible drinking in the UK.

6. Digital Media Aspects of Responsible Marketing

The Chair invited four panellists (representing the Commission services – DG INFSO, Diageo, EASA and the European Youth Forum to each present their perspectives on the issue of the marketing of alcoholic beverages on digital media.

In discussion, points raised included:

• There have been concerns that because the media is digital is it somehow considered "underhand".
• The digital media may offer more control than other media to allow companies to focus on people who are "legal targets", i.e. people of legal drinking age in a country.
• The 70% standard widely used by industry was challenged as being too low given the size of the public health problem in the EU.
• It was noted that the 70% rule (75% in the UK) is only used for public access websites, and that in relation to social networking sites, the logic is different because it is possible to know the users' age.
• It was highlighted that companies cannot control access to the information on fan pages (visible without Membership required) as these can be accessed by people of all ages.
• Companies inform that they make a cross check between their responsible messages from the traditional media to the new, and web-pages may carry warning messages on them indicating that you should not be there if under 18.

7. Forum commitments relating to digital media

The Chair invited the Dorum members where the website is a significant part of a commitment to present briefly these sites to the Forum, they were: SabMiller (www.talkingalcohol.com), Eurocare (www.eurocare.org), Diageo (www.DRINKiQ.com), Alcohol Action Ireland (www.alcoholireland.ie/), EFRD (http://www.responsibledrinking.eu and http://www.marketresponsibly.eu/).

In the Chair's view there is no obvious policy angle with which to pursue the digital issue as a separate topic: no reason to treat digital media differently from the traditional media. He noted that controls on this media seemed to be adequate (compare to other forms of media) and that the Commission services would keep watching the situation. He therefore foresaw no obvious follow up.

8. Forum next meetings: 18 November 2010