Members of Congress Appeal to FTC on Children’s Food Advertising
A group of U.S. senators and a group of U.S. representatives, all Democrats, each sent an identical letter to Federal Trade Commission (FTC) Chair Edith Ramirez calling for a report on 2014 food and beverage marketing expenditures aimed at children. They found it “unacceptable” that FTC “is not actively working on projects focused on food marketing to children,” pointing out that data gathered during 2014 and compiled into a report could serve as a five-year follow-up to a similar 2012 report on 2009 data. “A follow up report would help policy makers, public health practitioners, industry representatives, and the public understand how food marketing directed at children and adolescents has changed over the last five years and provide a critical opportunity to evaluate the continued role of such marketing in regards to the health of our nation’s children.”
The senators who signed the letter were Sens. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa), Richard Durbin (D-Ill.), Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), John Rockefeller IV (D-W.Va.), and Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio), and the representatives who signed include Reps. Rosa DeLauro (D-Conn.), Charles Rangel (D-N.Y.), Mark Takano (D-Calif.), James Moran (D-Va.), Barbara Lee (D-Calif.), and Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-D.C.).
Issue 537
