"Small is beautiful" was a mantra every body was swearing at, during the fifties, sixties and seventies of the last millennium. This was adopted in many developing countries as a policy for industrial development. Many manufacturing activities were reserved for small scale industries, obviously for protecting them from the high-resource based larger players. On the other hand capitalistic regimes of the First World were chanting the "scale of economy" mantra to justify mega ventures allowing the birth of large multinational corporates with wide reach and muscle. This philosophy has naturally led to appreciation of every thing that is large and most of the health afflictions amongst the populations in these countries can be attributed to jumbo size food and beverage servings that became industry standards eventually. New realization seems to be dawning on the industry that the money spinning jumbo products are suffering from an identity crisis calling for a changed strategy. Thus was born the "minis" with the hope that industry will be able to refurbish their image as a savior of the consumer!
"This "portion-control option" is designed to help people manage their calorie intake while still enjoying the beverages they love, according to a news release from L. Celeste Bottorff, vice president of Coca-Cola's Living Well initiative. Coca-Cola hopes she's right. With obesity at crisis levels, public health advocates are calling for a tax on sugary drinks. In the past decade, they say, per-capita intake of calories from sugar-sweetened beverages (read: soda) has increased by nearly 30 percent. Beverages now account for 10 to 15 percent of the calories consumed by children and adolescents. With each can or glass of sugared beverage consumed per day, the likelihood of a child's becoming obese increases by 60 percent".
How far the new strategy will work remains to be seen. Probably availability of options for a lower cost version may yet persuade the consumer to chuck the jumbos and indirectly help the nation's cause in counter acting the obesity onslaught that is eroding the economic productivity of the citizens. India is fortunate in developing the industry on a mini scale and there are hundreds of food products available in the market for Rs 1-5 category containing smaller portions. The low purchasing power amongst bulk of the population could be the real reason for such massive down sizing of product packs but it may prove to be a 'blessing in disguise' with a potential to prevent over eating and related consequences.
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