Lay summary
Intestinal disease such as inflammatory bowel disease and colorectal cancer, increase mortality and reduce quality of life. Food as complementary medicine holds promise as an early preventative measure to reduce disease burden. Promotion of manaakitanga to eat healthily is likely to increase uptake of advice particularly from deprived communities. However, more effort is required to encourage simpler, more affordable and effective evidence based dietary advice. Apples are a low-cost, commonly consumed fruit that improves gut health and reduce gut inflammation. The activation grant will go towards: capacity and relationship building with clinicians and the community to provide scientifically backed information around simple and efficacious apple preparations using ongoing apple research; and to gather information on apple consumption habits. Ongoing end-user feedback established from this grant and research data collected, will inform the direction of future research and advice on natural food as complementary medicine for management of chronic inflammatory disease.