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Christina McKercharAssociate Professor in Māori Health

BCApSc, MSc with distinction, PhD

Email christina.mckerchar@otago.ac.nz
Tel +64 3 364 3638

Department of Public Health
University of Otago, Christchurch
PO Box 4345
Christchurch 8140

Background

Christina is of Ngāti Kahungunu, Tūhoe, and Ngāti Porou descent. She trained as a nutritionist and worked for a number of years for Te Hotu Manawa Māori, a national Māori Health provider, before her academic career. Her research has focused broadly on the right to healthy food. She has researched the food environment, especially food availability and marketing, food security and food sovereignty, and other aspects of public health that impact hauora Māori, including alcohol, transport, and housing.

Christina is a member of Climate Health Aotearoa, and is on the Food Expert panel for Health Coalition Aotearoa. She also chairs the Māori Research Advisory Rōpū, to support Māori Health Advancement at the University of Otago, Christchurch.

Teaching

Research interests

  • Public Health Nutrition
  • Food security
  • Māori Health

Current projects

Completed projects

Current supervision

  • Nicki Williams, PhD
  • Cara Meredith, PhD
  • Els Russell, Master of Public Health (Thesis)
  • Tom Worters, Master of Public Health (Thesis)

Completed supervision

Publications

Cleghorn, C., Kidd, B., Morris, T., & McKerchar, C. (2026). Food policies to support healthy and environmentally sustainable diets. The Briefing, (8 April). Retrieved from https://www.phcc.org.nz/briefing/food-policies-support-healthy-and-environmentally-sustainable-diets Journal - Research Other

Cleghorn, C., McKerchar, C., Kidd, B., & Ni Mhurchu, C. (2026). Modelled health impacts of three stakeholder-selected policies to support healthy and environmentally sustainable population diets in New Zealand. Food Policy, 140, 103049. doi: 10.1016/j.foodpol.2026.103049 Journal - Research Article

Frost, H., Te Morenga, L., Mackay, S., McKerchar, C., Cole, E., & Egli, V. (2026). Alcohol marketing exposure to children in New Zealand: A systematic narrative review. Journal of the Royal Society of New Zealand, 56, e70007. doi: 10.1002/snz2.70007 Journal - Research Other

Worters, T., McKerchar, C., Gage, R., Reidy, J., & Signal, L. (2026). Piecing together piecemeal regulation: Stakeholder insights into joint statutory regulation to reduce children's unhealthy commodity marketing exposure in Aotearoa New Zealand. Health Promotion Journal of Australia, 37(2), e70153. doi: 10.1002/hpja.70153 Journal - Research Article

Barthow, C., McKerchar, C., Jones, B., McKinlay, E., & Coppell, K. (2025). Using a citizen's jury to inform type 2 diabetes prevention in an ethnically diverse urban community in Aotearoa. Proceedings of the Australasian Diabetes Congress. 300. Retrieved from https://diabetescongress.com.au/ Conference Contribution - Published proceedings: Abstract

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