Five years ago a number of corporations, big city governments and civil organisations in the Netherlands agreed to work together to fight obesity and promote healthy eating at work, at school and in stores. In a report, presented to health minister Ab Klink on Monday, the Covenant Obesity presented mixed results.

Obesity seems to have stabilised among adults: on average 52 percent of men and 41 percent of women are overweight. Around 11 percent of people over 20 is "seriously overweight". But obesity is increasing among children: 15 percent of boys and 18 percent of girls are overweight and 1 in 7 babies and toddlers are overweight, up from 1 in 10 a decade ago.

Low-income people are more at risk for obesity. Earlier research by the AMC hospital in Amsterdam showed that people from Turkish, Moroccan or Ghanaian origin are two to three times more likely to be overweight.

The Netherlands scores average for obesity among European countries. But covenant president Paul Rosenmöller, the former leader of the Green party GroenLinks in parliament, said his ambition is to make Dutch children the healthiest in Europe in five years time.

In order to reach that goal he is proposing to follow the French approach, which has been successful at reducing obesity by combining the efforts of local governments with the public and private sector. One goal is to get Dutch children to engage in physical activity at school for at least one hour every day.

Parents too need to be engaged in the process. According to Rosenmöller parents failing to give their children healthy food occasionally constitutes child abuse.

The ministers of health and youth have so far opted for self-regulation: food producers, local government, schools, parents and children all have to work together to get a grip on the problem. But the Labour party in the Dutch parliament, a government coalition partner, now says the government's attitude is "very worrisome".

"This is currently one of the main health issues, and yet there is no sense of urgency," said Labour member of parliament Khadija Arib. She said the results of the covenant were proof that self-regulation is not working. But parliament as a whole is not in favour of government intervention, such as a ban on advertising for candy aimed at children.

Covenant president Rosenmöller said blaming the government is too easy. "If we want results everybody needs to get involved. We can't have the government decide what people can or cannot eat at home."

The ministers in charge of health and family earlier promised to provide a quarter of all schools in the Netherlands with a healthy cafeteria by 2010. Parliament forced them to raise that goal: by 2014 every school will have to offer health food to the children.