The Complexity of Food Provisioning Decisions by Maori Caregivers to Ensure the Happiness and Health of Their Children

Obesity in children is a global health concern. In New Zealand, one in three school entrant children are overweight or obese. M¯aori, the indigenous people, are disproportionately represented among the lowest economic group and have a disproportionately high incidence of obesity. ThisstudyexploredM¯aoriparents’andcaregivers’viewsoftherelativeimportanceofweight to health, and the facilitators and barriers to a healthy weight in children aged 6 months to 5 years. Using a grounded qualitative method, in-depth information was collected in focus groups with mostly urban parents and other caregivers. A general inductive thematic analysis (content driven) was used. Insufficient money was an overriding food provisioning factor, but cost interacted with the lack of time, the number of people to feed, their appetites, and allergies. Other factors included ideologies about healthy food, cultural values relating to food selection, serving, and eating, nutrition literacy, availability of food, cooking skills, and lack of help. Childhood obesity was not a priority concern for participants, though they supported interventions providing education on how togrowvegetables,howtoplanandcookcheapermeals. Holisticinterventionstoreducethenegative effects of the economic and social determinants on child health more broadly were recommended.