Companies wanting to become a healthier workplace will be attending the fifth annual Cornwall and Isles of Scilly Healthy Workplace Awards on Monday at the Royal Cornwall Showground in Wadebridge.

Hosted by Cornwall Council’s Health Promotion Service, the event will showcase how local businesses have created a healthy culture at work and delegates will take part in workshops designed to help them make changes around important topics like tackling dementia and increasing physical activity.

Stuart Bourne, acting director of Public Health, says “Local businesses are being offered the opportunity to find out how a healthier workforce is a great asset to their business, and can save them money. This is the fifth year of the Awards and we are delighted to have reached the milestone where over 100 employers have now received a bronze, silver or gold award.”

At the 2015 award ceremony a total of 36 awards will be presented in various categories.

The awards will be presented by Dame Carol Black, national advisor on Work and Health to the Department of Health and the event will be opened by Cllr Jeremy Rowe, deputy leader of Cornwall Council and chair of the Cornwall Health and Wellbeing Board.

Evidence shows health is good for work and work is good for health. For instance, those who smoke six cigarettes a day or more have a 34% higher incidence of being absent than non-smokers, and a 10% higher incidence of being absent for longer. So encouraging staff to give up smoking benefits the staff themselves, and the company.

It is estimated that the annual economic costs of sickness absence and worklessness is over £100 billion. This year’s award winners identify significant benefits from the programme including sickness absence being cut in half in one organisations since working for the award and two-thirds of staff being trained in Heartstart (emergency life saving skills) at another employer.

A range of opportunities are offered to staff through the programme including stress management support, physical activity challenges and help to stop smoking or improve diet.

Cllr Jeremy Rowe said: “I am delighted to be attending the awards ceremony to hear many inspiring stories of change from the award winners. It is vital that we create opportunities to build better health and wellbeing into our daily lives and the workplace is an ideal way to do that. Moving to better daily habits like walking more or eating a healthier lunch is much easier to achieve with the right facilities and support from work colleagues.”

You can find out more about the healthy workplace scheme at www.behealthyatwork.org, where you can download a brochure, look at previous winners, and express an interest in joining the scheme. You can follow the awards ceremony on Twitter:#HWAwards15 .