Is the junk food era contracting? Latest trend indicates such a directional change in the food sector

Unhealthy foods are supposed to be overwhelming the populations in many countries causing untold miseries in the form of life style diseases like obesity and disorders like diabetes, CVD, kidney impairment, cancer etc. The modern food processing industry which manufactures and peddles thousands of products to the unwary consumers is partly to blame for this tectonic shift in the health status of to day's denizens. Of course lack of determination to lead a disciplined life and greater and greater addiction to sugary and fatty foods with low nutrient density on the part of the consumer also contribute to this potentially dangerous situation. It is against this background one has to appreciate the reversal of a trend in the past of increased consumption of unhealthy foods as reflected by the data released recently in the US. This is indeed encouraging and must be welcomed by the health experts hoping for a reinvigorated society with declining diseases and improved health. 

"The U.S. food industry has got decisions to make, decisions that could make or break companies that have been in business for decades. When Pepsico CEO Indra Nooyi told analysts last month that the soft-drink market "continues to be under pressure from a volume perspective," that's another way of saying not as many people are drinking soda. In fact, as the Wall Street Journal recently reported, soda and cereal revenue has contracted about 2 percent a year in the United States for the past two years. That's based on data from Euromonitor International. Go back a little further and you find that U.S. soda and cereal sales are down 25 percent since 1998. But there are other changes:

--Orange juice per capita consumption is down 45 percent in this country over the past 17 years

--Frozen dinner sales are down nearly 12 percent from 2007 to 2013

--Sales of organic products hit $39.1 billion in 2014, up 11 percent over the previous year, according to the Organic Trade Association."

If one relies on these figures what would be the response from the industry which has been taking the consumers for a ride during the last 5 decades by playing to their palate rather than to their health? Alarms are being raised about declining sales volumes of products like soft drinks affecting their bottom line and surely the industry must be mulling over new strategies for recapturing its lost clientele. However if the organic food industry has registered impressive growth during the last few years, the writing on the wall is clear. The message is to the industry to mend its ways and give more attention to the well being of its clients when future strategies are drawn up. What is disturbing is the declining consumption of healthy products like orange juice which may be due the deceptive ways by which sugar laden dilute juices are sold as genuine juice and the consumer seeing through this deceit. Probably the industry has no alternative but to focus more on converting many of their products to healthier ones by avoiding use of unnecessary chemicals, too much sugar, fat and salt  and making them more nutritious and safe using natural raw materials and ingredients that make it possible. 

V.H.POTTY
http://vhpotty.blogspot.com
http://foodtechupdates.blogspot.com

Soda market moving to India? Latest investment on soft drinks in Hyderabad

When we are being bombarded with the Prime Minister's pet theme of "Make in India", day in and day out, there was great hope that products identified for manufacture, both for domestic and export consumption would be highly relevant to the country's needs. Of course the relevance of a product is determined by factors like consumer demand, environmental hazard, health implications, employment generated, water exploitation, farmer linkages etc. By no stretch of imagination manufacture of soft drinks can fit into this bill but if current trend is any indication foreign investors will invest only if they have a market for their products, rightly so.  Is soft drink an item of consumption that must be encouraged in our country when world over these products are being condemned for their empty calories and vulnerability of consumers to a host of diseases including CVD, blood pressure, kidney ailments, obesity, diabetes etc ? Recent report coming from Andhra Pradesh claiming that an MNC is investing in that state on a piece of land measuring 85 acres of government land for setting up a mega bottling plant is indeed disturbing. Should India be rolling red carpet to such investors who have very little regard for the well being of the citizens in this country? It is difficult to justify or rationalize this industry as the highly automated plant is unlikely to provide much employment or earn any foreign exchange! Here is a take on this paradox that is happening in front of our eyes with all and sundry paying obeisance to the dollar lord!   

"For the past 25 years, PepsiCo has been investing in the Indian economy and its people. As we move forward into our next 25 years, that commitment is stronger than ever. This plant is an investment in India's bright future," said Nooyi. Spread across 86 acres, the first line of the plant started manufacturing on Friday. When it becomes fully operational, it would benefit nearly 33,000 farmers thanks to local sourcing of mangoes and other fruits, Nooyi said. Speaking on the occasion, Naidu said local sourcing of mangoes would immensely benefit the region economically. Complimenting the Sri City management for attracting dozens of companies to set up shop there, Naidu said it could become India's largest industrial park in 10 years. The PepsiCo plantwill manufacture fruit juice-based drinks, carbonated soft drinks, and sports drinks, among other beverages. PepsiCo has deployed state-of-the-art technologies with an emphasis on production efficiencies, environment protection and safety. The plant will be PepsiCo's most water-efficient beverage plant in India and the firm aims to procure LEED certification for this facility, company officials said. a LEED, or Leadership in Energy & Environmental Design, is a set of rating systems for the design, construction, operation, and maintenance of green buildings, homes and neighborhoods. It is developed by the US Green Building Council. PepsiCo has a large manufacturing facility, with seven production lines in Telangana to cater to the markets of the undivided Andhra Pradesh and parts of Karnataka. The company, which has 22 brands in its product portfolio comprising food and beverages, has annual retail sales of about $1 billion. Sitting on a land bank of 8,000 acres, Sri City currently houses 106 companies employing 25,000 directly The GVK group plans to set up a hospital, medical college and a research centre at Sri City with an initial investment of Rs 100 crore, according to officials."

Andhra Pradesh government which is bending backwards to please the MNC seems to be forgetting what happened in Kerala years ago when the people of Plachimeda, a small hamlet in that state where a similar bottling plant was allowed to be set up led to one of the most virulent opposition campaigns India has ever seen against the corporate investor. Besides over exploiting water resources, the spent water polluted the area heavily causing many problems to the local population and thanks to people's power the bottling plant was forced to be shut down once for all. Interestingly the investors in A.P are using sugar coated words like employment generation, benefiting the farmer, high technology, research and innovation etc to mislead the government. It is difficult to imagine how farmers are going to benefited if the major product made is flavored sugary water, though there is a sprinkling of fruit based but sugar sweetened drinks containing traces of natural fruit solids! Unhealthy products like potato chips, fried and heavily salted extruded snacks etc are going to be the major part of the turn over expected from this factory. There is not even a single healthy product in the portfolio of products churned out by this company justifying conferring so much favors on it. If this is the forerunner of things to come under the "make in India" slogan, where is this country going to end up? God save the country!

V.H.POTTY
http://vhpotty.blogspot.com
http://foodtechupdates.blogspot.com

Healthy foods Vs unhealthy foods-A contrasting marketing landscape

Considering all the factors that have contributed to the progressive deterioration of health among people, the most important is the way food marketing environment is changing every where in the world. Food technology developments are boosting the capability of food processing industry to create foods tailor made to "trap" the consumers, with no concern about their well being. There is a qualitative transformation of the food "environment", that includes food retailing and eating places, where proportion of healthy foods to the total number of products offered to the consumers has been decreasing alarmingly resulting in more and more people sucked into the unhealthy food trap. Added to this the cost difference between healthy foods and junk foods is widening with the former some time costing more than double that of junk foods. Why is this happening? Does the market place play a part in this cost escalation vis-a-vis health foods? Or does the consumer attitude is responsible for this phenomenon? Probably this is a complex issue on which it may be difficult to arrive at a consensus. Here are some observations made by one of the study groups concerned about the deteriorating food environment that may drown this planet in agony and despair soon if some thing drastic is done to arrest the trend.

"Last December, researchers at Harvard published a paper scientifically examining a complaint common among conscientious eaters -- that healthy food is more expensive than junk. That paper, published in British Medical Journal, found that eating a healthy diet costs approximately $1.50 more per day. Today, researchers in the United Kingdom published a study in PLOS ONE that gives yet more insight into this topic: not only is healthy food more costly than unhealthy food but the price gap between them has grown significantly over a 10-year period. The researchers, led by Nicholas Jones from the University of Cambridge, used data from the UK Consumer Price Index to track the cost of 94 foods and beverages from 2002 to 2012. They also used  a technique called "nutrient profiling" to determine which foods might be considered healthy and unhealthy, based on information such as the amount of saturated fat and sugar per 100g. What they found: in 2012, 1000 kcal of "healthy" food cost approximately $12, while 1000 kcal of unhealthy food cost only $4. And while the mean price of all foods rose 35 percent over that 10-year period, the researchers found that "the price of more healthy foods was consistently greater than that of less healthy foods over the period 2002–2012, and that the absolute price gap between healthy and less healthy foods has grown over this period. "Food poverty and the rise of food banks have recently been an issue of public concern in the UK," Jones said in a statement about the research," but as well as making sure people don't go hungry it is vital that that a healthy diet is affordable."

One of the mysteries associated with the working logistics of modern food industry is how it is able to offer foods considered desirable, but not necessarily healthy, at such low prices and still make money? Mass production and bargaining muscle probably enable it to bring down production cost significantly. On the other hand insufficient demand for healthy foods make the manufacture some what less profitable making it a necessity to increase their price. Is it not paradoxical that when awareness about health and its relation to food is rising fast among people creating more and more demand for such foods in the market place, industry is unable to offer such products at prices comparable to that of junk foods? What justification industry can offer in making a whole wheat bread almost 50% costlier than white flour based bread? Technological limitation cannot be trotted out as an excuse because technology is relatively a minor component in the costing exercise. Considering these facts there is an urgent necessity for governments world over to bring in more regulations to compel the industry to manufacture more healthy foods and offer them on par with regular products now being churned out. The situation can become alarming if the present trend is allowed to continue with unhealthy foods overwhelming the portfolio of healthy foods, consumers can lay their hands on in the market place.    

V.H.POTTY

http://vhpotty.blogspot.com/

http://foodtechupdates.blogspot.com

TAXING "UNHEALTHY FOODS"!-WILL IT WORK?

The year just passed by had seen many governments grappling with the over weight and obesity epidemics visiting their citizens and how best to dissuade the consumers from gorging on high energy, high fat, high sugar foods. By now it is universally recognized that there is an established connection between unbalance foods and bad health conditions and unless more discipline is exercised regarding eating, more and more resources, personal as well national, will have to be deployed to fight the impact of bad eating. Of course there are many reasons as to why people binge on foods but the fact remains that like an addiction the habit of consumption of harmful foods refuses to go away creating more moribund people requiring medical attention and treatment. One of the suggestions which is being considered by many countries involves imposing extra taxes on processed foods containing high fat, high sugar, high saturated fat and high salt content. Probably Denmark gets the credit being the first country to impose such taxes on foods not considered healthy. While government coffers will be augmented by these taxes, the consumer can be expected to patronize such foods less frequently. A win-win situation? Wait and see!

"Fatty foods and candy could soon be swelling the coffers of the Danish state by up to DKK 1.5 billion per year with the introduction of an 'unhealthy food tax' at the beginning of 2010. A new study by the Confederation of Danish Industry's Food Branch (DI) reveals that a range of taxes on chocolate, sodas, sweets and ice cream would generate well over 1 billion kroner, making Danish indulgence the costliest in the entire EU. There are also suggestions to impose a saturated fat tax on butter, margarine, vegetable oil and cheese of DKK 25 per kg, in line for introduction in mid 2010. This will represent an overall increase of 27 percent in food charges says the report in the Copenhagen Post".

Whether Denmark, part of the large European Union, is suitable for experimenting with the new approach, may be debatable because those bent on eating calorie-rich foods can alway cross the borders to lay their hands on such foods at much lower cost, defeating the very purpose of the legislation. One is reminded of earlier cases of alcoholic beverages and cigarettes which are heavily taxed to discourage consumption due to their adverse influence on human health but these products continue to be marketed even to day in almost all parts of the world. Whether same thing can happen to calorie rich foods also remains to be seen!

V.H.POTTY
http://vhpotty.blogspot.com/
http://foodtechupdates.blogspot.com

"BAITING" WITH TOYS-PLOY FOR ATTRACTING KIDS TO JUNK FOODS

Targeted advertising aimed at attracting innocent kids to unhealthy but high profit foods by the industry is a matter of concern in many countries striving desperately to fight the epidemic of childhood obesity. Such practices have reached uncontrollable proportion when some of the established industry players started offering attractive toys as temptation to kids and parents, finding it extremely difficult to control their kids, from rushing to such promoted products. Inclusion of cheap toys in food packs or offering toys under promotional schemes is a strategy many food processors follow but "bribing" the kids through toys to come to restaurants is a ploy of recent origin. The lame excuse that these toys are offered to increase the pleasure of eating out for the entire family cannot be justification for such questionable practices.

"Tempting kids with toys is unfair and deceptive, both to kids who don't understand the concept of advertising, and to their parents, who have to put up with their nagging children," said Michael Jacobson, executive director of the Center for Science in the Public Interest. The group, which previously took on fast-food chain KFC over artery-clogging trans fats, alleged that the practice is illegal under consumer protection laws in states including California, Texas, New Jersey and Massachusetts. "It's a creepy and predatory practice that warrants an injunction," Stephen Gardner, CSPI's litigation director, said in a statement. McDonald's called the group's charges a "misrepresentation" of its effort to sell healthier food and safe toys. "Getting a toy is just one part of a fun, family experience at McDonald's," spokesman William Whitman said in a statement. In 2006, the latest year for which data is available, fast-food companies, led by McDonald's, spent more than $520 million on advertising and toys to promote children's meals, according to a U.S. Federal Trade Commission report. The latest Happy Meal promotion from McDonald's is a tie-in with the popular DreamWorks Animation film "Shrek Forever After." The meals include toy watches fashioned after the movie's characters Shrek, Donkey, Gingy and Puss in Boots".

Of course if such promotional techniques are used for popularizing healthy meals for the kids, there should not be any objection to these promotional programs of the restaurant industry. But if the recent reports about the low quality of kids meals and unhealthy effect on their consumption are to be believed, catering industry has lot to answer for their irresponsible attitude vis-a-vis kids. Responsible industry players like McDonalds must give a lead to the rest in restoring the credibility of the industry and promote human welfare through concrete and positive action..

V.H.POTTY

http://vhpotty.blogspot.com/

http://foodtechupdates.blogspot.com

BLOATING BODIES-A PROFESSOR'S CURE!

There are many divergent views about the relation between food and nutrition, some even against the present established norms of nutrition science. There are claims that fat is not responsible for obesity, salt is not injurious to health, sugar is not harmful, HFCS cannot be blamed for some of the disorders, etc. Of course absence of unanimity always presents problem when food standards and policies are to be drawn at national and international levels. But what is galling is the continued vacillation in taking bold policy decisions that will have a chance to reverse the present trend of uncontrolled production and consumption of unbalanced products being churned out by many manufacturers in the food processing sector.

"But the professor said New Zealand was going against the world trend, even among conservative governments. Its policy amounted to a subsidy for bad foods and taught children that eating them was normal. He said obesity and the diseases it causes - such as heart disease, diabetes and some cancers - would overwhelm health services without major changes. Simply telling people about healthy eating and activity was of limited value as educational methods worked only on the well educated".

"PROFESSOR'S CURE * Ban junk food from state-owned premises.* Reduce GST on fruit and vegetables and increase it on foods high in sugar, salt and saturated fat.* Introduce coloured "traffic light" labels to grade packaged foods for consumers from healthy to unhealthy.* Ban food marketing to children.* Establish food and activity requirements for school".

Though many of the cures proposed are already known, there is no unanimity amongst scientists as well as the policy makers regarding desirability of controlling the industry too much, especially under a democratic system. It is better that a universal consensus is evolved amongst the members of WTO that can be the basis for evolving a sound policy of influencing the "health content" of products from the industry which will help not only the consumers in each country but also facilitate hassle free global trade in "good" foods.

V.H.POTTY
http://vhpotty.blogspot.com/
http://foodtechupdates.blogspot.com