 |
Human Events...
Obama’s Food Police
in Staggering Crackdown on Market to Kids
by Audrey Hudson
06/21/2011
Tony the Tiger, some NASCAR drivers and cookie-selling Girl Scouts will
be out of a job unless grocery manufacturers agree to reinvent a vast
array of their products to satisfy the Obama administration’s food
police.
Either retool the recipes to contain certain levels of sugar, sodium
and fats, or no more advertising and marketing to tots and teenagers,
say several federal regulatory agencies.
The same goes for restaurants.
It’s not just the usual suspected foods that are being targeted, such a
thin mint cookies sold by scouts or M&Ms and Snickers, which
sponsor cars in the Sprint Cup, but pretty much everything on a
restaurant menu.
Although the intent of the guidelines is to combat childhood obesity,
foods that are low in calories, fat, and some considered healthy foods,
are also targets, including hot breakfast cereals such as oatmeal,
pretzels, popcorn, nuts, yogurt, wheat bread, bagels, diet drinks,
fruit juice, tea, bottled water, milk and sherbet.
Food industries are in an uproar over the proposal written by the
Federal Trade Commission, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention,
Food and Drug Administration and the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
“The most disturbing aspect of this interagency working group is, after
it imposes multibillions of dollars in restrictions on the food
industry, there is no evidence of any impact on the scourge of
childhood obesity,” said Dan Jaffe, executive vice president of the
Association of National Advertisers.
The “Interagency Working Group on Food Marketed to Children,
Preliminary Proposed Nutrition Principles to Guide Industry
Self-Regulation Efforts” says it is voluntary, but industry officials
say the intent is clear: Do it, or else.
“When regulators strongly suggest a course of action, it’s treated as a
rule, not a suggestion,” said Scott Faber, vice president of federal
affairs for the Grocery Manufacturers Association. “Industry
tends to heed these suggestions from our regulators, and this
administration has made it clear they are willing to regulate if we
don’t implement their proposal.”
It’s not just the food industry that will be impacted. Hundreds
of television shows that depend on the advertising revenue, such as the
Nickelodeon Channel, ESPN, and programs including “American Idol” will
be affected, critics of the proposal say—at a cost of $5.8 trillion in
marketing expenditures that support up to 20 million American jobs.
If the food is not reformulated, no more ads or promotions on TV,
radio, in print, on websites, as well as other digital advertising such
as e-mail and text messaging, packaging, and point-of-purchase displays
and other in-store marketing tools; product placement in movies,
videos, video games, contests, sweepstakes, character licensing and toy
branding; sponsorship of events including sport teams and individual
athletes; and, philanthropic activity tied to branding opportunities.
That includes softball teams that are sponsored by food companies and
school reading programs sponsored by restaurants.
“The Interagency working group recommends that the food industry,
through voluntary self-regulatory efforts, make significant
improvements in the nutritional quality of foods marketed to children
and adolescents ages 2 to 17 years,” the proposal says.
“By the year 2016, all food products within the categories most heavily
marketed directly to children should meet two basic nutrition
principles. Such foods should be formulated to … make a
meaningful contribution to a healthful diet and minimize the content of
nutrients that could have a negative impact on health and weight.”
The foods most heavily marketed directly to children and adolescents
fall into 10 categories: “breakfast cereals, snack foods, candy, dairy
products, baked goods, carbonated beverages, fruit juice and
non-carbonated beverages, prepared foods and meals, frozen and chilled
desserts, and restaurant foods.”
Beth Johnson, a dietician for Food Directions in Maryland, said many of
the foods targeted in this proposal are the same foods approved by the
federal government for the WIC nutrition program for women, infants and
children.
“This doesn’t make any sense whatsoever,” Johnson said. “It’s not
going to do anything to help with obesity. These are decisions I
want to make for my kids. These should not be government
decisions.”
Read it at Human Events
|
