Food Industry's Tactics Mirrors Big Tobacco

Food Industry's Tactics Mirrors Big Tobacco

Key To Tackling Obesity: Loosen Industry Grip On Regulation

The Federal Government must loosen the food industry's grip on food regulation if we're going to successfully help Australian's find healthier food options with better information and support, consumer group CHOICE said today.

The recommendation forms part of CHOICE's submission to the Select Committee into the Obesity Epidemic in Australia. Public hearings for the inquiry are being held in Sydney on Monday.

CHOICE Campaigns and Policy Team Lead, Katinka Day, says the tactics the food industry uses today mirror those used by the tobacco companies to oppose health policies and is calling on the Federal Government to curb industry attempts to influence policy for commercial gain.

"Similar to big tobacco, the interests of the food industry are entirely at odds with public interests. If we're going to address obesity and make sure people have the clear information they need, we need a strong food regulatory system that is free from undue influence from the food and beverage industry," Ms Day says.

"Currently companies like Nestle, Kelloggs, Coca-Cola and other food and beverage manufacturers play an active role in policy decision making through formal policy processes, consultations and through providing research and advice to governments. These companies don't have an interest in creating healthy, consumer-friendly food environments, they have an interest in selling their products.

We shouldn't repeat the mistakes of the past. We know that it would be outrageous to give tobacco companies the reins when it comes to tobacco control laws – so why are we giving the food and beverage lobbyists a similar level of influence in debates about health and food labelling?

"The risk is that when you have the food industry actively involved in policy decisions we see a lot of talk and no real action on the key issues affecting Australians' health.

"The food industry employs a range of tactics to unduly influence how health policy is made in Australia including funding research, pre-empting regulation through weaker voluntary initiatives and actively seeking to unreasonably discredit research that they don't agree with," says Ms Day.

In its submission, CHOICE outlines a number of tactics the food and beverage use to influence food and health policy, including:

Paying for conflicted evidence: Big food and beverage companies have funded a number of research papers that support practices that run contrary to dietary advice.
Self-regulation and voluntary codes: 'Collaborative forums' such as the Food and Health Dialogue or self-regulatory codes to restrict junk food marketing to kids only serve to ward off real, effective regulation and act as a distraction from genuine reform.
Influencing policy in favour of industry by providing conflicted experts: Sanitarium was heavily involved in developing the health star ratings algorithm, and many Sanitarium products that are loaded with sugar score quite well. For example, Sanitarium's products generally receive a high star rating; a 500mL bottle of Banana Flavoured Up and Go scores a 4.5 star rating despite containing almost eight teaspoons of sugar.

"The Federal Government has a responsibility to ensure we have a strong food regulatory system that is free from undue influence from the food and beverage industry so that we can have food labels that really work for consumers," said Ms Day.

See the detail of CHOICE's submissions here. 

Photo by Mariana Montes de Oca on Unsplash