Anti-sugar crusader Robert Lustig has joined University of California, San Francisco, (UCSF) colleagues Laura Schmidt and Claire Brindis to co-author commentary in the February 2, 2012, edition of Nature that advocates regulating fructose like alcohol and tobacco. A specialist in neuroendocrinology at the UCSF School of Medicine, Lustig has garnered attention in national venues such as The New York Times for comparing sugar to a poison and linking it to metabolic dysfunction, cardiovascular disease, diabetes, liver cancer, and other noncommunicable diseases. Details about his previous work appear in Issue 391 of this Update. Titled “The Toxic Truth About Sugar,” the latest article in Lustig’s arsenal maintains that because people in the developed world consume “an average of more than 500 calories per day from added sugar alone,” fructose now meets the four criteria used by public health advocates to justify regulation; that is, “unavoidability (or pervasiveness throughout society), toxicity, potential for…
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The Association of National Advertisers’ 2012 Advertising Law & Public Policy Conference will reportedly target how best “to navigate today’s complex marketing landscape and remain on the cutting edge in an ever-challenging legal and regulatory environment.” Slated for March 28-29, 2012, in Washington, D.C., the conference will include sessions on (i) global views of online behavioral advertising and self regulation, (ii) coping with changes in class-action law, (iii) expectations from the U.S. Supreme Court, (iv) “how the long arm of criminal law is increasingly reaching into marketers’ boardrooms and impacting in-house counsel,” and (v) key issues facing federal agencies.
The Center for Progressive Reform has issued a paper titled “Protecting the Public from BPA: An Action Plan for Federal Agencies.” Contending that the chemical bisphenol A (BPA), which is used extensively in food contact materials, has negative health effects in low doses and that federal agencies have failed, to date, to regulate it, the center outlines short-term and long-term actions they should take. Among other matters, the paper suggests that the Food and Drug Administration use its new mandatory recall authority under the Food Safety Modernization Act to “recall certain foods containing toxins such as BPA, if the health hazard concerns become too great and traditional regulatory methods ineffective at protecting the public.” The paper also recommends that the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) update its Integrated Risk Information System, which contains toxicological profiles on industrial chemicals, “to include current data to reflect the risks that have recently come to light,…
A National Academies National Research Council panel has issued a report acknowledging the progress made by the National Nanotechnology Initiative in researching the environmental and potential health effects of engineered nanomaterials (ENM), but criticizing an overall failure to link research with strategies to prevent and manage risks. Headed by Jonathan Samet, who teaches at the University of Southern California Keck School of Medicine and has long researched, written about and crusaded against tobacco smoke and the industry, the panel calls for the development of a strategic research plan “independent of any one stakeholder group, [with] human and environmental health as its primary focus.” The report advocates that four research categories be addressed within five years: “identify and quantify the nanomaterials being released and the populations and environments being exposed”; “understand processes that affect both potential hazards and exposure”; “examine nanomaterial interactions in complex systems ranging from subcellular to ecosystems”; and…
Switzerland-based Nestlé S.A. has announced plans to fund a dairy farming institute in Shuangcheng, China, to help the region’s suppliers expand their businesses and source “high quality milk sustainably.” According to a January 11, 2012, press release, the new institute “aims to be the country’s leading dairy training center, offering teaching courses from national and international experts.” The company and city of Shuangcheng are reportedly investing 2.5 billion Chinese yuan in the project, which will also guarantee bank loans for purchasing additional cattle and increase the “training and technical assistance already provided to local farmers.” As further noted in a January 13, 2012, Wall Street Journal article, Nestlé evidently “hopes to increase its market share in China’s dairy industry” and believes larger farms will help “boost production and efficiency while projecting a reputation for safety.” Other foreign companies such as Fonterra Co-Operative Group Ltd. have likewise indicated interest in more consolidated…
Animal rights activists have reportedly claimed responsibility for an arson fire that destroyed 14 cattle trucks and other equipment at Harris Ranch in California’s San Joaquin Valley. In an anonymous e-mail message to the media, activists said the January 8, 2012, fire was started to protest “the horrors and injustice of factory farming.” The message ended with, “Until next time.” Apparently no people or animals were injured in the fire at the farming operation, one of the largest cattle feedlots in California and the 14th largest in the United States. See Truth About Trade & Technology, January 17, 2012.
The National Advertising Division (NAD®) of the Council of Better Business Bureaus has reportedly determined that while Gerber Products Co. can justify certain of its baby food advertising claims, others should be modified or discontinued. Competitor Beech-Nut apparently challenged claims pertaining to Gerber’s “Graduates” product line before the industry self-regulatory body. Among other matters, NAD® found that “unique and innovative” claims were substantiated, and that Gerber could continue to make two exclusivity claims: “Only Graduates Lil’ Entrees is designed just for toddlers, with protein, grains, and a side of veggies . . . [o]f items in the Baby Aisle” and Gerber Graduates Healthy Meals are “The only meals designed for preschoolers with protein and a full serving of veggies.” NAD® took issue, however, with “the message conveyed by Gerber’s TV commercials for its Fruit & Veggie Melts. This commercial features a voiceover that claims, ‘the Gerber generation is making their fruit…
A recent report issued by the British Heart Foundation (BHF) and Children’s Food Campaign (CFC) has described online food marketing to children as “pervasive,” with more than 75 percent of websites targeting children with high fat, sugar and salt (HFSS) products “linked to a corresponding product or brand page on a social networking site” such as Facebook or Twitter. Titled “The 21st century gingerbread house: How companies are marketing junk food to children online,” the report concluded that 80 percent of 100 food brand websites analyzed between April and July 2011 did not meet the Food Standard Agency’s nutrient profiling standards for advertising during children’s TV programming. In particular, the report highlighted the use of (i) “bespoke websites which appeal to children through the use of language intended for, spoken by or directly to children”; (ii) “brand characters, cartoons and animations which are enormously popular with children”; (iii) “free gifts including…
Yale University’s Rudd Center for Food Policy & Obesity recently published a study claiming that “children are disproportionately targeted by food company Websites using branded computer games, known as advergames,” which allegedly promote “calorie-dense nutrient-poor foods.” Jennifer Harris, et al., “US Food Company Branded Advergames on the Internet: Children’s exposure and effects on snack consumption,” Journal of Children and Media, November 2011. According to the study’s abstract, Rudd Center researchers found that 1.2 million children visit food company advergame sites every month and that “playing these games increases children’s consumption of junk food.”
According to a December 7, 2011, New York Times book review, a new tome by freelance writer Tom Mueller has claimed that 50 percent of the olive oil sold in America “is, to some degree, fraudulent.” Based on an August 13, 2007, New Yorker article, Extra Virginity: The Sublime and Scandalous World of Olive Oil apparently aims “to demonstrate the brazen fraud in the olive oil industry and to teach readers how to sniff out the good stuff.” To this end, Mueller reportedly explains how unscrupulous suppliers “frequently adulterate olive oil with low-grade vegetable oils and add artificial coloring,” resulting in “a urine-colored and musty butter substitute.” But aside from such “alarming” statistics, Times critic Dwight Garner ultimately found the prose too “unctuous” for his taste. “The Food and Drug Administration considers this adulteration a low priority. Grody olive oil is not killing anyone. We’re talking about a first-world problem here,” Garner…
