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Food Industry Is Now Calling Junk Food ‘Healthy’ – Why Could That Be?
Food corporations are hoping to cash in on the growing public concern about nutrition by launching a program that labels some junk food healthy.
Smart is the new cool thing. There’s a smart car, cities now tout smart growth, and you can buy a smart refrigerator. Now comes another breakthrough: Even your breakfast cereal has gotten smart.
At least that’s what we consumers are being told by a group of major food corporations that are hoping to cash-in on the growing public concern about nutrition. Your concern is their concern, they say, so these eager-to-serve marketers have launched a snappy food labeling campaign to guide your nutritional choices. They’ve designated hundreds of their food products as being not just tasty, zesty and zowie — but also good for you.
You’ll know which ones to reach for on the supermarket shelf because they’ll be labeled with a snappy green checkmark on the front of their packages, along with the phrase, “Smart Choices.”
The industry says that this seal of approval is all about helping today’s busy shoppers save time. No need to read those tedious lists of ingredients on the backs of food boxes, bottles, jars and cans, for the simple green checkmark is your one-glance reassurance that you’re making the smart nutritional choice for your family.
You know, smart choices like Froot Loops, Fudgesicle bars and Frosted Flakes. Yes, all of these sugar-saturated concoctions and many more have received the industry’s good-for-you checkmark.
Well, snaps one of the designers of the labeling scheme, it’s not a matter of selecting foods that are the best for you, but of helping consumers choose products that are better than those that would be the nutritional worst. For example, she says: “You’re rushing around, you’re trying to think about healthy eating for your kids, and you have a choice between a doughnut and a cereal. So Froot Loops is a better choice.”
Uh … no, ma’am. Not necessarily so. A serving of Froot Loops is 41 percent sugar. Good grief — there are plenty of doughnuts with a better nutritional balance than that. And, by the way, the average American supermarket does not limit our breakfast choices to doughnuts or Fruit Loops.
What we have here is yet another corporate PR scam. This supposedly independent nutritional certification program was created and is paid for by such purveyors of unhealthy sugars, fats, salt and chemical additives as Coca-Cola, ConAgra, General Mills, Kellogg’s, Kraft and PepsiCo. Each of them pay fees of up to $100,000 a year to get to use the Smart Choices label, and the fees are based on the total sales of products that bear the label.
This means that the more food items certified by the Smart Choices program, the more money it collects, which gives it an incentive to apply the label liberally. Thus, we get such absurdities as this: “light” mayonnaise, which contains less fat than regular, has been granted the better-for-you check mark; but so has regular mayonnaise!
Still, the industry and its apologists insist that even highly processed foods deserve to get a nutritional star because many of them are fortified with essential vitamins and other nutrients. But, as pointed out by Dr. Michael Jacobson of the Center for Science in the Public Interest, “You could start out with some sawdust, add calcium or Vitamin A and meet the (Smart Choices) criteria.”
Jacobson, who served on the initial panel to develop standards for the Smart Choices program, resigned last year noting “(the panel’s) main decisions are determined largely by industry members.”
Among the decisions that troubled him was one that allows the Smart Choices label to be applied, as Jacobson wrote, to foods “containing caffeine, food dyes, the preservative BHA, artificial sweeteners (particularly saccharin, aspartame and acesulfume-K) and other additives that are suspected of causing or have been shown to cause adverse reproductive, behavioral, or gastrointestinal effects or cancer.
Sanctioning these foods is not smart, it’s stupid. And deceptive.
http://www.sott.net/articles/show/193658-Food-Industry-Is-Now-Calling-Junk-Food-Healthy-Why-Could-That-Be-
Thank goodness, someone with half a brain is telling the truth about the foods on our shelves.
When I grew up we had 3 choices for breakfast cereals: Wheaties, Cornflakes, Cheerios[plain], and Shredded Wheat[also plain]. By the way, I’m 72.
When I raised my children, now 40 and 42, I refused to buy the garbage that was beginning to appear on the shelves for breakfast; i.e., Froot Loops and the like. I’m so glad I didn’t. Neither of my children have any cavities to this day, and I feel their health overall is better for it. When they complained saying their friends all ate that [junk], I’d say “you can go live with your friends anytime you want to, but it will not be brought into this house.”
The food industry has done a horrendous dis-service to our country over the years, and GREED is the motivator. It’s sad that so many buy into the marketing nonsense without question. We’re poisioning our children!
I applaud you for putting this info out there.
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Stupid is as stupid does.. If some one isn’t smart enough to see through this propaganda they deserve to eat it.lol
THE TRUTH IS OUT THERE (But you have to READ and LOOK for it)
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Getting down to basics is part of the answer. That means eating whole foods, whole fruits, vegetables and grains. Eating as much organic as you can afford.
We do so appreciate highlighting yet another scam by the big corporate monopolies that run this country. My concern is that only the people who already know how to read a label, make wise healthy food choices are receiving this message. How do we reach a young brainwashed generation? How do we educate people that addiction is not just to alcohol and drugs, but also to sugary sweets, processed non-foods and drinks?
Keep up the good work.
Debby
HomeopathyWorldCommunity
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Thanks for the story. Another example of corporate greed. Where is the public interest?
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