Michele Simon Targets Report on Calorie-Reduction Pledge

“In what is becoming an all too familiar sight, the major food corporations
recently teamed up with the First Lady’s Partnership for a Healthier America to
announce their latest PR attempt to look like they are helping Americans eat
healthier,” opines food activist and attorney Michele Simon in a June 19, 2013,
post on the Corporations & Health Watch blog. According to Simon, the food
companies that pledged in 2010 to reduce calories “in the marketplace” by
1.5 trillion have “jumped the gun” in proclaiming their success, as the official
evaluation funded by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation has not yet been
released.

In particular, Simon cites Bruce Bradley, “a former food industry executive
turned blogger and author,” who questions the accuracy of a preliminary
report issued by the Healthy Weight Commitment Foundation (HWCF). “First
off, measuring something like this at such a high level is recipe for bias. There
are just so many ways to manipulate the data to say what you want,” he writes,
alleging that pre-recession data, an increase in the consumption of private
label foods and the lower/no calorie beverage trend would ultimately skew
the final results. “Then when you consider who is issuing the report (HWCF)
and their self-interest in appearing as responsible, I am very suspicious.”