In response to a call from the 58th World Health Assembly (May 2005), the World Health Organization (WHO) established the Guidelines Review Committee (GRC) in 2007 with the purpose of developing and implementing procedures to ensure that WHO guidelines are developed in ways consistent with internationally recognized best practices, emphasizing the appropriate use of systematically reviewed available evidence.

To implement the strengthening of evidence-informed nutrition guidance, and in addition to convening experts in guideline development groups (GDGs) to address a particular topic, the Department of Nutrition and Food Safety also coordinates the work of the  WHO Nutrition Guidance Expert Advisory Group (NUGAG), established to develop a series of guidelines on topics related to healthy diets. NUGAG  consists of two subgroups:

NUGAG, as with other GDGs, provides advice to WHO on the development of nutrition guidelines, including:

1. The scope of the guidelines and priority questions (in PICO format) that will guide the undertaking of systematic reviews of evidence;
2. The selection and prioritization of important outcomes for decision-making and developing recommendations;
3. The examination and interpretation of the evidence with explicit consideration of the overall balance of risks and benefits;
4. The formulation of recommendations, taking into consideration the quality of evidence generated and compiled as well as diverse values, balance of benefits and harms, resource implications, priority of the problem, equity and human rights, acceptability and feasibility; and
5. The identification of research gaps.