Over-Nourishment catches up Undernourishment
Nania Poulson—10/2004 |
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As the number of over-nourished catches up
the number of undernourished people in the world,
we need to take a hard look at our modern diets. |
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ITS AUGUST EDITION, the National Geographic highlighted
a startling fact: there are now as many over nourished
people as undernourished around the world. It points
the finger at a dangerous mixture of increased calorie
consumption, labour saving technology and the powerful
marketing of fast food. In Europe more than half of
all food adverts promote fast food, sweetened cereals
and confectionary, so it is unsurprising that in the
last five years in the UK alone snack food consumption
has risen 25 percent. |
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| At the end of last year a report was commissioned
from Ofcom (Office of Communications) to re-evaluate
the existing code on the TV advertising of exactly
these kinds of snack foods and drinks to children.
The report failed to call for a total ban on this type
of TV advertising. There seemed to be a general feeling
of surprise in the media that there was going to be
no real action against broadcasters and advertisers
as a result of the report. In fact this lack of action
should not be in the least bit surprising when you
consider the economics of the situation. |
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| Even in the introduction to the report Ofcom set
out that although it has a duty of protection to children
this must be balanced by what they describe as, "a
healthy broadcasting ecology." They go on to comment
that if their findings have a negative impact on either
broadcasters or stakeholders (advertisers?) that changes
are unlikely to be acceptable unless there is a "clear
and significant social benefit." Basically it boils
down to the fact that broadcasters cannot afford to
lose the £522M a year which is spent on advertising
confectionery, soft drinks, crisps, savoury snacks,
fast food and pre-sugared breakfast cereals to children
every year. Not to mention the sums at stake to the
food industry, in 2002 £433M was spent on junk
food by 8 - 16 year olds on their way to and from school,
alone! |
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| However the report makes fascinating reading and
really highlights the lifestyle trends which shape
the way we eat, the way we feed our children and the
way in which food is marketed, not just to children
but to all of us. Modern living has moved us far away
from the three square meals a day of our parents' generation.
We seem to be grazing and snacking around increasingly
long working hours and this is affecting our children's
diets. Now that we are relatively cash rich and time
poor the food industry have many more marketing opportunities
to create "instant" food which caters to our
overwhelming need and desire for convenience. This
has resulted in cereal bars for breakfast and microwaveable
meals and snacks for quick fixes. The demand for ready
meals has grown by 42% since 1990. In comparison to
the French we eat twice as many ready meals and six
times as many as the Spanish. 80% of British homes
have a microwave compared to 27% of Italian households.
Apart from the health aspects of eating this kind of
food, these figures suggest that we are also loosing
the tradition of cooking in this country. |
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| In their quantitative survey Ofcom found only one
fifth of parents and children to be enthusiastic about
cooking and that 42% of children did not like to help
cooking. The basic skills required to make a soup,
pastry or a simple vegetable stew used to be learnt
by watching and helping in the kitchen but with this
level of disinterest it looks like these skills will
totally die out. Then the crisis will redouble as it
will not just be a case of simply re-educating people
about what to eat but, also how to cook it! |
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| There is also a growing trend towards children eating
on their own. In these cases the child's tastes are
more specifically catered for with sugary and salty
foods and they are therefore not being exposed to a
variety of so called "adult" foods. These "children
only" meals are another opportunity for the food
industry to create ready meals which children can prepare
alone. These meals tend not only to contain high levels
of salt and fat and generally low levels of vitamins
and minerals which are lost in the processing, they
also tend not to be eaten with vegetables, never mind
parents! |
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| So this convenience trend is the fertile ground on
to which advertising scatters the seeds of suggestions
about which brands are desirable. However the report
concludes firmly that the level to which TV advertising
does have an effect is considered to be only a "modest" one.
It claims that in fact compared with other influences
on children's food choices it is only a small factor
and that as a single approach to reducing obesity that
banning TV advertising to children would be ineffective.
However the other influences cited by the report are
taste preference, price, familiarity, peer pressure
and parental convenience. Surely these "other influences" are
the direct product of advertising and clever marketing
by food manufacturers. Familiarity with food products
and brands comes from advertising, peer pressure comes
from other children's exposure to brand pressure, taste
preference, price and convenience for parents are simply
part of the marketing package. |
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| The report does admit that the indirect effects of
advertising such as peers attitudes and raising awareness
via other forms of promotion do have a substantial
and powerful effect. However as the report points out,
this is not only un-researched but also probably un-researchable.
It seems trite to discount this aspect of influence
because it cannot be exactly quantified but that is
exactly what the report does; it simply says that as
research cannot provide an "uncontroversial demonstration
of the causal effect" that it is therefore not
able to use it as valid evidence. |
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I think we realise by now that the fight against
obesity in our children will have to be a many pronged
approach including exercise, teaching them to cook,
better school lunches etc. In the meantime surely a
sensible starting point would be to drastically reduce
the marketing opportunities these food giants have
to establish brand relationships with children so early
on in their consumer lives. |
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