Good News! Childhood Obesity Rates Declining in NYC
Marion Nestle / Food Politics
Dec. 16, 2011
Just in time for the holidays, we get some good news. The New York City Health Department reports that rates of childhood obesity are falling.
If the rates were staying constant, I’d consider it a step forward. But these results show rates going down, even if only by a few percentage points.
The Bloomberg administration says the numbers are a result of its anti-obesity initiatives, some focused especially on children. Health Commissioner Dr. Tom Farley told the New York Times that he attributes
the progress partly to the city’s aggressive advertising campaign against sugary sodas, which he said may have altered what parents were providing to their children. The city has also tried to add healthier options to school lunch menus, enacted strict rules on the calorie and sugar content of snacks and drinks in school vending machines, and even put limits on bake sales, a move that caused some grumbling.
As I explained to Bloomberg News, if this trend continues, it will represent the first truly positive development in years.
It also suggests that the health department’s unusually aggressive efforts to address obesity may be paying off. If so, they should inspire other communities to do the same kinds of things. If nothing else, they raise awareness of the problem and help create an environment more conducive to healthy eating.
On the national level, Michelle Obama’s Let’s Move campaign also has raised awareness. Could it be that we are getting to a tipping point?
It’s pretty clear by now what works. A Cochrane meta-analysis of 55 studies finds strong evidence to support beneficial effects of child obesity prevention programs on BMI, particularly for kids age 6 to 12.
The interventions showing the most promise are just like those in New York City:
- School curriculum that includes healthy eating, physical activity and body image
- School sessions for physical activity throughout the school week
- Improvements in nutritional quality of the food supply in schools
- Environments and cultural practices that support children eating healthier foods and being active throughout each day (see yesterday’s post)
- Support for teachers and other staff to implement health promotion strategies and activities (e.g. professional development, capacity building activities)
- Parent support and home activities that encourage children to be more active, eat more nutritious foods and spend less time in screen based activities
These are showing measurable benefits. Shouldn’t every city start doing them.
Source: Marion Nestle / Food Politics
The good food news of 2011
22 Dec 2011
2011 was a big year for food politics. In case you dozed off anywhere along the way, I’ve collected the year’s most important stories below. (Want something lighter? See my Sustainable Food Trends story from last week. Want something heavier? Here’s the bad food news.)
1. Urban farming is flourishing.
An urban farm in Chicago.Photo: Piush Dahal
While the renewed interest in growing food within city limits is nothing new, 2011 was the year urban farming went legit.
Despite several low points involving criminal charges for gardeners in Michigan and Tennessee (charges were dropped in both cases after word spread around the internet and people from across the country petitioned lawmakers), the year was full of highlights. In San Francisco, Oakland, Chicago, San Diego, and Baltimore, city officials changed local laws to make it easier to farm. Meanwhile, New Yorkers celebrated the first year of legal beekeeping. And creative, scrappy projects like the Boston Tree Party and Detroit’s Growing Joy Community Garden flourished.
Meanwhile, corporate interests are also keying into the possibilities of urban agriculture. We heard from a vertical farming expert on the subject.
2. Young farmers make noise.
Photo: Eddie Crimmins
More and more young Americans are taking to the farm, a trend that’s continued to grow this year. They’re getting creative — returning to using draft horses, for example. And they’re getting political — the National Young Farmers’ Coalition has put together an agenda for the upcoming 2012 farm bill, pushing for easier to access land and loans. LGBT farmers (young and otherwise) are also changing the face of farming.
3. Local food isn’t just delicious and eco-friendly.
2011 presented us with even more evidence that local food systems don’t just taste good and feel good; they also build local economies. More farmers markets mean more jobs, overall.
4. Food Day makes a comeback.
Although the organizers called this year’s national event the first annual Food Day, there had apparently been another attempt in the 1970s. Let’s hope this versions sticks. Check out our slideshow.
5. We don’t need industrial ag to feed the world.
Photo: BASF
Feeding the world doesn’t have to depend on genetically modified rice like this. Yes, the world’s population is growing rapidly (see Grist’s series “What to expect when you’re expanding“), and the question of how to feed all 7 billion of us is an important one. Far too often, however, “feeding the world” has become code for farming with as many chemicals and GMO seeds as possible.
This year brought mounting evidence to the contrary, including a study published in Nature and another published in Science that say otherwise. The results of a long-term study by the Rodale Institute also proved that organic farming is just as productive as conventional, and better at building soil (this is key, since “yield” is at the heart of the “feed the world” discussion).
6. Despite the influence of the ultra-consolidated meat industry, the “ag-gag” bills went nowhere.
Early on in 2011, lawmakers in Florida, New York, Iowa, and Minnesota tried to pass so-called “ag-gag” bills that would have made it illegal to produce — and in Minnesota to possess — undercover videos of livestock factory farms. The bills were part of a coordinated effort by Big Ag, but the sustainable food movement organized to defeat them, and, in a rare win, succeeded.
7. Eaters are (a little) more aware of the people behind their food.
Photo: U. Roberto Romano
The situation for workers in the food system isn’t exactly good news, but I’m putting it in this category because 2011 saw a number of small but important strides.
Food service provider Bon Appétit Management Company took two big steps: First, it released the first comprehensive report on documented farmworker rights and abuses in years. Then it hosted TEDx Fruitvale: Harvesting Change, an event entirely dedicated to the plight of farmworkers and other food system workers.
Meanwhile, food worker advocates produced a guide to restaurants that treat their employees well. And the Department of Labor proposed new child labor rules for farms, expected to be officially enacted next year.
8. Food access got more attention.
Too many people around the U.S. still lack easy access to good, healthy food. Fortunately, activists and farmers made a lot of creative progress this year in helping to raise awareness and tackle the root problems.
A group of advocates from an Oakland-based organization called Live Real took to the road for the Food and Freedom Rides.
Tiny groceries made out of shipping containers: one way to increase food access.Fifty young people began working in schools, gardens, and advocacy organizations as part of the first class of Food Corps participants. We spoke with three of them.
Subsidizing farmers markets was shown to be an effective strategy for getting more healthy food into food deserts. And farmers themselves looked for creative ways to address food access, such as this give-a-dozen-buy-a-dozen program modeled after Toms Shoes.
Slow Food USA sought to show that supporting local farmers doesn’t require going broke with its $5 Challenge. And a group of grad students tried out a model for small, portable grocery stores built out of shipping containers — a potential solution for under-resourced areas without traditional grocery stores.
9. More information helps eaters make better choices.
Photo: Frank Farm
Although food safety continued to be a huge concern (see our “bad news” list in part 2) some food choices were made a little easier in 2011.
For example, organic chicken was proven to carry significantly lower salmonella risk, there’s more evidence that organic milk is better for you,
As it turns out that most “use-by” dates are meaningless.
10. The Occupy movement adds fuel to the fire.
Advocates and farmers jointed the Zuccotti Park gathering this fall, and we heard from a variety of folks who were occupying various aspects of the food system — like one farmer who occupied the pasture.
Just as important as any march or rally, however, the activism taking place over last few months has gotten more eaters to think critically about where their food dollars are going, and to consider investing in local and sustainable food enterprises rather than Wall Street.
SOURCE: Twilight Greenaway (author), Organic Consumers Association/Grist
Food Corporations Buy Silence from “Partners”
Currently browsing posts about: CSR (Corporate Social Responsibility)
By Marion Nestle from her blog ‘Food Politics’ Dec. 17, 2010
Does corporate social responsibility pay off for corporations? Indeed it does. Corporate money buys silence, if nothing else.
William Neuman of the New York Times provides a perfect example of how corporate sponsorship gets precisely what it is intended to do.
In this particular case:
- The corporations are soda companies, Coke and Pepsi.
- The social responsibility is donations of millions of dollars to a good cause.
- The cause is Save the Children, a group devoted to child health and development projects internationally and domestically.
- The intention? Get Save the Children to stop advocating in favor of soda taxes.
Not long ago, Save the Children was a strong advocate for soda taxes. Now it is not. How come? The group’s website explains:
about a minute ago we said, Corporate donors support us but do not pressure us. Our focus is children not soda tax policy. Back to saving more children now.
The Times, however, suggests a different explanation:
executives at Save the Children were seeking a major grant from Coca-Cola to help finance the health and education programs that the charity conducts here and abroad, including its work on childhood obesity.The talks with Coke are still going on. But the soda tax work has been stopped….In interviews this month, Carolyn Miles, chief operating officer of Save the Children, said there was no connection between the group’s about-face on soda taxes and the discussions with Coke. A $5 million grant from PepsiCo also had no influence on the decision, she said. Both companies fiercely oppose soda taxes.
A mere coincidence? I don’t think so. This is a clear win for soda companies, just as was Coca-Cola’s sponsorship of the educational activities of the American Academy of Family Physicians. You can bet those activities do not involve telling parents not to give sodas to their kids.
Is this a win for Save the Children? The Times reports that the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, which funds some of the group’s anti-obesity initiatives, is disappointed. Evidently, its $3.5 million donation wasn’t enough to convince the group to continue its anti-soda activities.
In the meantime, soda taxes continue to stay on the radar as a weight control strategy. A new study in the Archives of Internal Medicine suggests that soda taxes could lead to a small but potentially significant weight loss.
According to FoodNavigator’s report about the study,the authors say that applying such taxes throughout the United States could generate a billion dollars or more. It quotes lead researcher Eric Finkelstein: “Although small, given the rising trend in obesity rates, especially among youth, any strategy that shows even modest weight loss should be considered.”
This kind of study is a challenge to soda companies. Watch Coke and Pepsi continue donations to charitable and health groups and watch those groups say not one word about the contribution of sodas to obesity. Cigarettes, anyone?
Source: Marion Nestle, blog ‘Food Politics’
Marion Nestle, Currently Browsing Posts About: Radioactivity
by Marion Nestle, from her blog “Food Politics”
March 20, 2011
Uh oh, Radioactive iodine in Japanese food
Japanese health authorities have found levels of radioactive iodine and cesium in spinach, milk, and water. They detected levels of iodine-131 up to seven times higher than safety limits in spinach collected from six farms as far as 75 miles from the reactors.
How serious a problem is this? From a strictly scientific viewpoint, probably not much. But note the “probably.” From the standpoint of the public, the problem is very serious indeed.
What’s happening with the Japanese food supply gets us into the classic contradictions of risk communication. Consider this response:
After the announcements, Japanese officials immediately tried to calm an already-jittery public, saying the amounts detected were so small that people would have to consume unimaginable amounts to endanger their health. “Can you imagine eating one kilogram of spinach every day for one year?” said State Secretary of Health Minister Yoko Komiyama. One kilogram is a little over two pounds.
Edano [chief cabinet secretary] said someone drinking the tainted milk for one year would consume as much radiation as in a CT scan; for the spinach, it would be one-fifth of a CT scan….Drinking one liter of water with the iodine at Thursday’s levels is the equivalent of receiving one-eighty-eighth of the radiation from a chest X-ray.
Is the Japanese public likely to be reassured by these statements? They remind me of the British minister who went on TV and fed a hamburger to his small daughter during the mad cow crisis of the early 1990s. It didn’t work.
We are talking about food here. Something that people put in their bodies and those of their children.
Specialists in risk communication would view radioactive spinach as a problem ranking high on anyone’s “dread-and-outrage” scale.
Radioactivity is not visible, is not under personal control, and is technological, unfamiliar, and foreign. This makes something like this really, really scary, as I explain in the introduction my book Safe Food: The Politics of Food Safety.
So the statements of American experts don’t help much either:
“The most troubling thing to me is the fear that’s out of proportion to the risk,” said Dr. Henry Duval Royal, a radiologist at Washington University Medical School.
Yes it is. Understandably so. And Japanese officials will have a hard time dealing with it unless they are thoroughly forthcoming with information, earn the trust of the public, and take the fears seriously.
Update, March 21: The New York Times account on this issue from March 20. The March 21 story describes the spread of the radioactive materials:
Spinach from a farm in Hitachi, about 45 miles from the plant, contained 27 times the amount of iodine that is generally considered safe, while cesium levels were about four times higher than is deemed safe by Japan. Meanwhile, raw milk from a dairy farm in Iitate, about 18 miles from the plant, contained iodine levels that were 17 times higher than those considered safe, and milk had cesium levels that were slightly above amounts considered safe.
Source: Marion Nestle, “Food Politics”
Food Industry Secrets
U.S. News & World Report
10 Things the Food Industry Doesn’t Want You to Know
By Adam Voiland – Mon Oct 20, 2008
Two nutrition experts argue that you can’t take marketing campaigns at face value.
With America’s obesity problem among kids reaching crisis proportions, even junk food makers have started to claim they want to steer children toward more healthful choices. In a study released earlier this year, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported that about 32 percent of children were overweight but not obese, 16 percent were obese, and 11 percent were extremely obese. Food giant PepsiCo, for example, points out on its website that “we can play an important role in helping kids lead healthier lives by offering healthy product choices in schools.” The company highlights what it considers its healthier products within various food categories through a “Smart Spot” marketing campaign that features green symbols on packaging. PepsiCo’s inclusive criteria–explained here–award spots to foods of dubious nutritional value such as Diet Pepsi, Cap’n Crunch cereal, reduced-fat Doritos, and Cheetos, as well as to more nutritious products such as Quaker Oatmeal and Tropicana Orange Juice.
But are wellness initiatives like Smart Spot just marketing ploys? Such moves by the food industry may seem to be a step in the right direction, but ultimately makers of popular junk foods have an obligation to stockholders to encourage kids to eat more–not less–of the foods that fuel their profits, says David Ludwig, a pediatrician and the co-author of a commentary published in this week’s Journal of the American Medical Association that raises questions about whether big food companies can be trusted to help combat obesity. Ludwig and article co-author Marion Nestle, a professor of nutrition at New York University, both of whom have long histories of tracking the food industry, spoke with U.S. News and highlighted 10 things that junk food makers don’t want you to know about their products and how they promote them.
1. Junk food makers spend billions advertising unhealthy foods to kids.
According to the Federal Trade Commission, food makers spend some $1.6 billion annually to reach children through the traditional media as well the Internet, in-store advertising, and sweepstakes. An article published in 2006 in the Journal of Public Health Policy puts the number as high as $10 billion annually. Promotions often use cartoon characters or free giveaways to entice kids into the junk food fold. PepsiCo has pledged that it will advertise only “Smart Spot” products to children under 12.
2. The studies that food producers support tend to minimize health concerns associated with their products.
In fact, according to a review led by Ludwig of hundreds of studies that looked at the health effects of milk, juice, and soda, the likelihood of conclusions favorable to the industry was several times higher among industry-sponsored research than studies that received no industry funding. “If a study is funded by the industry, it may be closer to advertising than science,” he says.
3. Junk food makers donate large sums of money to professional nutrition associations.
The American Dietetic Association, for example, accepts money from companies such as Coca-Cola, which get access to decision makers in the food and nutrition marketplace via ADA events and programs, as this release explains. As Nestle notes in her blog and discusses at length in her book Food Politics, the group even distributes nutritional fact sheets that are directly sponsored by specific industry groups. This one, for example, which is sponsored by an industry group that promotes lamb, rather unsurprisingly touts the nutritional benefits of lamb. The ADA’s reasoning: “These collaborations take place with the understanding that ADA does not support any program or message that does not correspond with ADA’s science-based healthful-eating messages and positions,” according to the group’s president, dietitian Martin Yadrick. “In fact, we think it’s important for us to be at the same table with food companies because of the positive influence that we can have on them.”
4. More processing means more profits, but typically makes the food less healthy.
Minimally processed foods such as fresh fruits and vegetables obviously aren’t where food companies look for profits. The big bucks stem from turning government-subsidized commodity crops–mainly corn, wheat, and soybeans–into fast foods, snack foods, and beverages. High-profit products derived from these commodity crops are generally high in calories and low in nutritional value.
5. Less-processed foods are generally more satiating than their highly processed counterparts.
Fresh apples have an abundance of fiber and nutrients that are lost when they are processed into applesauce. And the added sugar or other sweeteners increase the number of calories without necessarily making the applesauce any more filling. Apple juice, which is even more processed, has had almost all of the fiber and nutrients stripped out. This same stripping out of nutrients, says Ludwig, happens with highly refined white bread compared with stone-ground whole wheat bread.
6. Many supposedly healthy replacement foods are hardly healthier than the foods they replace.
In 2006, for example, major beverage makers agreed to remove sugary sodas from school vending machines. But the industry mounted an intense lobbying effort that persuaded lawmakers to allow sports drinks and vitamin waters that–despite their slightly healthier reputations–still can be packed with sugar and calories.
7. A health claim on the label doesn’t necessarily make a food healthy.
Health claims such as “zero trans fats” or “contains whole wheat” may create the false impression that a product is healthy when it’s not. While the claims may be true, a product is not going to benefit your kid’s health if it’s also loaded with salt and sugar or saturated fat, say, and lacks fiber or other nutrients. “These claims are calorie distracters,” adds Nestle. “They make people forget about the calories.” Dave DeCecco, a spokesperson for PepsiCo, counters that the intent of a labeling program such as Smart Spot is simply to help consumers pick a healthier choice within a category. “We’re not trying to tell people that a bag of Doritos is healthier than asparagus. But, if you’re buying chips, and you’re busy, and you don’t have a lot of time to read every part of the label, it’s an easy way to make a smarter choice,” he says.
8. Food industry pressure has made nutritional guidelines confusing.
As Nestle explained in Food Politics, the food industry has a history of preferring scientific jargon to straight talk. As far back as 1977, public health officials attempted to include the advice “reduce consumption of meat” in an important report called Dietary Goals for the United States. The report’s authors capitulated to intense pushback from the cattle industry and used this less-direct and more ambiguous advice: “Choose meats, poultry, and fish which will reduce saturated fat intake.” Overall, says Nestle, the government has a hard time suggesting that people eat less of anything.
9. The food industry funds front groups that fight antiobesity public health initiatives.
Unless you follow politics closely, you wouldn’t necessarily realize that a group with a name like the Center for Consumer Freedom (CCF) has anything to do with the food industry. In fact,Ludwig and Nestle point out, this group lobbies aggressively against obesity-related public health campaigns–such as the one directed at removing junk food from schools–and is funded, according to the Center for Media and Democracy, primarily through donations from big food companies such as Coca-Cola, Cargill, Tyson Foods, and Wendy’s.
10. The food industry works aggressively to discredit its critics.
According to the new JAMA article, the Center for Consumer Freedom boasts that “[our strategy] is to shoot the messenger. We’ve got to attack [activists'] credibility as spokespersons.” Here’s the group’s entry on Marion Nestle.
The bottom line, says Nestle, is quite simple: Kids need to eat less, include more fruits and vegetables, and limit the junk food.
Source: Adam Voiland, Reprinted from U.S. News and World Report
‘Food Politics’
Food companies will make and market any product that sells, regardless of its nutritional value or its effect on health. In this regard, food companies hardly differ from cigarette companies. They lobby Congress to eliminate regulations perceived as unfavorable; they press federal regulatory agencies not to enforce such regulations; and when they don’t like regulatory decisions, they file lawsuits.
Like cigarette companies, food companies co-opt food and nutrition experts by supporting professional organizations and research, and they expand sales by marketing directly to children, members of minority groups, and people in developing countries–whether or not the products are likely to improve people’s diets”. Quote from Marion Nestle, author of “Food Politics”, University of California Press, 2002.
If you want to understand how politicians, lobbyists and food companies have totally corrupted our food chain in America, you should read Marion Nestle’s books. At the time “Food Politics” was printed, the author was the chair of the Department of Nutrition and Food Studies at New York University. When I finished reading this book six years ago, I was truly blown away.
Everything I suspected about fast food restaurants in my neighborhood, raising rates of obesity, type 2 Diabetes appearing in children under the age of five and our government not protecting it’s citizens was revealed to be TRUE. Our government actually helps food companies to deceive to us. Even reading a food label in the grocery is no guarantee that that you are being told the truth. I always laugh when I pick up a box of cereal and find “Dehydrated Cane Juice” listed as the second ingredient on the label. Folks this means that the 2nd highest percentage of ingredients in this box of cereal is plain old SUGAR!
Your government allows this corporate game playing with our foods. In the mean time, people are becoming diseased and are dying and don’t know why. Tell me why are two and three year old children developing type 2 Diabetes during the past 30 years at a rate that this country has never seen before? Why have heart attacks for women between the the ages of 34 and45 increased by 30% over the last 30 years. Look at our food industry in America. It is not your friend.
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