The Internet is offering a wealth of information to more and more
people, but also an avenue for irresponsible businesses to exploit
consumer health concerns.
The rise of organic food is a knee-jerk reaction to consumer health
fears, and threatens to unhelpfully steer us away from improving
the quality of food generally.
Chocolate has a nice feeling to it - tasty, fun, luxurious and
slightly sinful. This is comfort food, accessible to all and
epitomised in the recent film, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.
In the US, the role of court action in defining limits not set by
regulators is generating a flood of costly court cases for the food
industry: much unnecessary, and all damaging.
Beer, bakery, confectionery, sweet drinks, pizzas, snacks galore,
and even dog food. The list of products with World Cup tie-ins is
dominated by junk food, while healthy food makers seem content to
pass up the marketing opportunities...
The relationship between journalist 'hack' and scientist 'lab-rat'
must be developed if science is to get a fair deal in the press,
and for consumers to be presented balanced and accurate science
coverage.
Parents should avoid infant formulas made from intact proteins, a
Stanford researcher told doctors assembled at the annual meeting of
the Pediatric Academic Societies.
It is time to admit that society is fighting a part-time battle
against the bulge, willingly lambasting soft drinks, burgers and
chocolate, while shuffling silently away from a fairly dismal
exercise rate.
Self-regulation has become the mantra of food groups who argue that
laws are not always necessary - but can industry be trusted when it
has failed so spectacularly in the past?
When a company 'gives back' to the world through charitable
donations, should we wholeheartedly commend it for being a good egg
or sniff cynically at the profit potential that underlies every
business decision?
The gamble by US authorities 15 years ago to let the industry deal
with benzene residues in soft drinks has failed, and instead only
kept those who needed to know in the dark.
The dust is settling on the WHI trial. First came the news that
low-fat diets didn't reduce the risk of breast or colorectal cancer
or cardiovascular disease, then came news that vitamin D and
calcium supplements don't protect...
The science has spoken. Low-fat diets don't work: Forget the
carrots and broccoli sprouts, I can now have my cake and eat it,
and put extra cream on top.
Little wonder consumers are confused about which foods are good for
them, and which bad, when scientists use methods with almost no
chance of meaningful results.
I am beginning to feel like a freak among journalists. Good or bad,
my reporting is the product of hours of questions, fact-hunting and
often-times editorial debate. Yet, despite this rigour, every day
we receive emails from people...
Complex webs of assumptions are spinning a lie about the real value
of today's companies, lulling directors and shareholders alike into
a false sense of value creation.
The oft-said adage that there are two things people don't want to
see being made - sausage and legislation - falls apart at the doors
of the EU's parliament.
If the EU keeps hiding its agriculture sector behind huge pay
cheques instead of devoting more time to food research funding, the
bloc's whimpering and wailing will only get worse.
After all the increased safety procedures put in place over the
past decade, one might have been lulled into thinking that
poisonings and deaths from food contamination would be rarer than
before. While it is true that the new regulatory...
Food companies do not yet face the ethical sourcing equation of the
clothing industry, where brands from Nike to Marks & Spencer
cannot afford a single claim of sweat-shop production. But the
moment is fast approaching for food,...
The crusade to end world hunger has been a bitter failure. But with
the world set to sweep away a crooked food trading system, there is
a chance to get it right - if only we could revive the FAO from
dormancy.
There is nothing so redolent of a corporate mid-life crisis as the
strategic equivalent of a new car, new girl and new image, set
firmly on the shoulders of the same old idea. McDonald's, it seems,
is firmly in the throes of...
The words clinical trial or scientifically proven on a label carry huge cachet. But behind the claims of scientific evidence, consumers expect a base level of rigour in ensuring thatfood or personal care products actually deliver the benefits they claim.
Cash, cash, cash. Castigated as simple asset-strippers out to make
a quick buck, the entrance of private equity onto the food industry
stage has participants chattering in the wings.
Praise where praise is due. And it is certainly due for one
small-time drinks firm in southern Britain, which is spear-heading
answers to global water shortages that threaten to wreak havoc on
food producers everywhere.
Henry Ford's famous aphorism that if he had asked people what they
wanted, they would have said faster horses, provides food makers
with a lesson they must learn.
In among the hollers about obesity and the concerns over nutrition,
food companies now need to work hard to ensure they clinch public
trust, as a matter of insurance. This means more than compliance on
traceability and labeling. This...
Water, we save. Energy, we conserve. But food, it seems, we can
waste, junk and bin and no-one cares. Except one crusader, whose
20-year project has proven what should have been obvious in the
first place: our attitude to food is...
Whether it is a pork pie from Melton Mowbray or olive oil from
Nimes, every Tom, Denis and Haemon seems to believe their local
food deserves the EU's protection from big, bad corporations.
One cannot envy the chief executive faced with a scientific study
that casts doubt over the efficacy or safety of his core product.
But avoiding a sales slump, media vilification and even charges of
fraud means squaring up to such...
As Chinese producers move in on western markets, the first response
by many established players is to protect and defend their previous
market positions. It's a doomed strategy.
A society that views food as taste-bud entertainment rather than a
basic of well-being was always bound to run into health problems.
But with obesity now afflicting 300m people, and diabetes set to
reach similar numbers within two...
It is time to draw on science to establish once and for all whether
food intolerance is just a source of succour for hypochondriacs, or
whether it is genuinely a modern scourge.
The image of secret radio chips planted inside the home from larder
to bathroom, transmitting data freely to Corporation Inc, is enough
to curl the toes of more than anti-capitalism activists.
It is a perversion of the 21st century that while affluent
societies continue the quest to slice the fat from their
increasingly obese populations, five million children die from
hunger each year, and more than 850m people go chronically...
The UK government must introduce a compulsory new supermarket code
ofconduct if it is to make up for past mistakes and save the food
industryfrom a spiral into anti-competitive practices.
