Regulation capture and and the food people eat

silverharp

Has the government got it wrong with the dietary advice they give? and if so why? have they directly or indirectly been bought off by the large food companies. Is it another example of where policies are put in place to suit producers and the customers pay the price. I think the US is similar in that the food pyramid is set by he Dept of agriculture, but of course firms like Archer Daniels wouldnt try to influence what goes on at the Dpert of Ag. would they and the dept would only consider the interests of citizens, right?


this articles seems like a reasonable summary of why the gov. has it wrong

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-1325453/Everything-thought-knew-food-WRONG.html

Myth: Food advisory bodies give us sound, impartial advice

the organisations we turn to for advice on food are sponsored by the food industry. The British Dietetic Association (BDA), whose members have a monopoly on delivering Department of Health and NHS dietary advice, is sponsored by Danone, the yoghurt people, and Abbott Nutrition, which manufactures infant *formula and energy bars.
The British Nutrition Foundation, founded in 1967 to ‘deliver authoritative, evidence-based information on food and nutrition in the context of health and lifestyle’, has among its ‘sustaining members’ British Sugar plc, Cadbury, Coca-Cola, J Sainsbury PLC and Kraft Foods.
‘When the food and drink industry is so actively embracing public health advice, isn’t it time to wonder how healthy that advice can be?’ says Harcombe.

According to Zoe Harcombe, the *obesity epidemic has less to do with our lifestyles than with what we are eating.
The key thing that people don’t realise is that throughout history, right until the Seventies, obesity levels never went above 2 per cent of the population in the UK,’ she says. ‘Yet by the turn of the millennium, obesity levels were 25 per cent.
‘What happened? In 1983, the government changed its diet advice. After that, if you look at the graphs, you can see obesity rates taking off like an aeroplane. You might feel it is coincidence, but to me it is blindingly obvious.

then if you look at Safefood's "eatwell plate" I can see "junk" food in the so called non junk catagories. If I ate the suggested diet I'd be always hungry and would end up eating loads of junk food.

http://www.safefood.eu/en/Consumer/Healthy-Living/Eating-Well/Eating-well1/The-eat-well-plate/

Nehaxak

There's no mention of crunchy nut cornflakes or koka noodles on that eatwell plate - half the population of Ireland would die if they couldn't eat those two on a daily basis !

oncevotedff

Nehaxak wrote: »

There's no mention of crunchy nut cornflakes or koka noodles on that eatwell plate - !

That could be because nearly all breakfast cereals are high in sugar content. A breakfast fry is probably healthier than a cereal.:D

johnnyskeleton

Would the diet and nutrition forum be better for this? I think that they will have a lot of stuff on it, but here's one (admittedly dubious looking) website criticising the food pyramid:

http://course.cookingslim.org/home/getting-started/the-real-food-pyramid

Although criticisms can be raised over the fact that junk food makes it into the pyramid at all, and likewise dairy is somewhat suspect, the big problem apparently is that cereals and grains play such an important part, whereas they should play a relatively minor part in your diet.

Is this because the US government is in cahoots with BigWheat Ltd, or is it because the US government at the time realised that they could produce more grain than they could fresh vegetables and fruit? Who knows, who is to say?

nesf

johnnyskeleton wrote: »

Is this because the US government is in cahoots with BigWheat Ltd, or is it because the US government at the time realised that they could produce more grain than they could fresh vegetables and fruit? Who knows, who is to say?

Some major US states in terms of presidential elections are major wheat producers. So a lot to do with it.

metamorphosis

Yeah - the US food pyramid set up in the 70s was done so with the help of the agri businesses and those who have lots of money invested in wheat and grain industry. The low fat hypothesis followed for the next 3 decades, the world got fat. Money is everything!

Read any nutririon books by Michael Pollan, Gary Taubes or Goldacre. They all touch off it in some shape and form

El_Dangeroso

Don't start me, I won't stop seriously! A lot of people say 'so what, no-one follows those recommendations anyway?'. Well unless you eat nothing outside of your own house that you prepared from scratch, then you are affected by those recommendations. Particularly relating to the oils that ALL restaurants, even high-end ones use. Traditional fats were abandoned in favour of 'heart-healthy' seed oils. In my opinion, that has probably had the biggest negative impact on health of any change in the last century. We're just scratching the surface with the research at the moment, the money that Unilever can pump into research is gargantuan compared to the independent studies, but they are trickling out, slowly but surely.

In fifty years or so we'll look at this:



In the same way we now look at this: