BLS Average Retail Prices - December

Watch out for those health claims

I have been reading Michael Pollan's book called "In Defense of Food" and one of things he wrote made me chuckle:

"Yet as a general rule, it's a whole lot easier to slap a health claim on a box of sugary cereal than on a raw potato or a carrot, with the perverse result that the most healthy foods in the supermarket sit there quietly in the produce section, silent as stroke victims, while a few aisles over in cereal the Cocoa Puffs and Lucky Charms are screaming their new found "whole grain goodness" to the rafters. Watch out for those health claims."

TK: Now we find that consumers are being beguiled by all manner of health claims and are eating so many "good for you" products that they are relentlessly adding to their girth. One Farm Bureau educational session that I missed in New Orleans talked about functional foods. From a Farm Bureau press release:

NEW ORLEANS, January 14, 2008 – An overload of health and nutrition information that many consumers find confusing and inconsistent is a primary cause of Americans’ ever-expanding waistlines, nutrition expert Rachel Cheatham said at a seminar during the American Farm Bureau Federation’s 89th annual conference.

Cheatham is director of science and health communications for the International Food Information Council, which works to bridge the gap between science and communications by collecting and circulating scientific information on food safety, nutrition and health.

The results of an extensive survey conducted by IFIC via the Internet in February 2007 show that 42 percent of survey respondents feel that the food and health information they receive from various sources is contradictory. Slightly more than 30 percent said it was inconsistent.

“This really is the issue,” Cheatham explained. “There is an overload of information. How do we package this information so that people understand it and know what to do with it?”

The survey results indicate very few people understand or apply the concept of energy balance, in which calories consumed and calories used are treated as an equation that results in weight maintenance, or depending on the individual’s goals, weight loss or gain. Almost half of the survey respondents said they don’t balance the calories they take in with the calories they use, while 16 percent said they do increase their exercise to compensate for eating more than usual.

“Very few people – only 16 percent – are saying ‘I get it,’” Cheatham said. “If we could only get consumers to understand if they take in 2,000 calories per day, for example, and burn 2,000 calories, their weight would be stable. We encourage people to know this, so they can do the basic math and take control of their weight.”

However, she acknowledged that calorie counting is a hard sell.

People’s lack of self-awareness, in terms of what they weigh, what their body mass index is and what it should be, is also an obstacle to getting consumers to think more about nutrition and exercise.

Almost a quarter of consumers who view themselves as being at an ideal weight are actually overweight, according to the survey. Seventy-three percent who think they’re overweight are actually obese.

“As we become more overweight as a society, we’re losing track of ourselves,” Cheatham said.

She added that the more obese and overweight people an individual is surrounded by, the less likely it is he or she will be concerned about his or her weight.

Cheatham emphasized there are simple tools to help consumers be more mindful about what they’re eating. She pointed out that most boxed and canned products carry a nutrition label detailing the calories, fat, fiber and nutrients per serving.

MyPyramid.gov helps computer users figure out how many calories they need per day and also allows them to input what foods they’ve eaten to make sure they’re meeting good health guidelines established by the federal government, such as eating a minimum of five servings of fruits and vegetables daily.

The survey results are available at www.ific.org.

TK: It might also work to tell people to eat less of a particular food (soda, high sugar foods) and more fruits and vegetables. At least we have one side of the equation with "Fruits and Veggies - More Matters."

California farmers and climate change

FDA's Food Protection Plan

Agriculture and global climate change

Stallman QA

Here is a link to an audio file Q and A with Bob Stallman, president of the American Farm Bureau Federation.

Cloning: Weird science?

Here is a link to a quick pro and con debate in Business Week on animal cloning, followed with liberal reader comments that reveal the misgivings of consumers about the process.

Here is more reaction on the issue:


From the Organic Trade Association:

The Organic Trade Association (OTA) today reiterated that meat, milk and other products produced from cloned animals will not be able to be sold as organic in the United States.

OTA issued the reassurance after the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) announced its conclusion that foods from cloned animals and their offspring are as safe as those produced from traditionally bred animals. FDA today posted a risk assessment report, risk management plan and guidance for industry to outline its regulatory approach on animal cloning.

The national organic standards enforced by the U.S. Department of Agriculture require that organisms be developed and grown by systems that must be compatible with natural conditions and processes-including the breeding and raising of animals for meat and for dairy or other animal production. Cloning as a production method is incompatible with the Organic Foods Production Act (OFPA) and is prohibited under the National Organic Program regulations. Thus, animals produced using cloning technology are incompatible with national organic standards and cannot be considered organic.

"The Organic Trade Association (OTA) only supports the use of traditional processes for breeding and raising animals in the organic system," said Caren Wilcox, Executive Director of OTA. "The organic business community has never supported cloning animals as a part of the organic process. Organic animal products will not come from cloned animals. In the future, consumers who seek to avoid cloned meat, dairy or other animal products should look for the organic label on products."

In response to the FDA announcement, the National Organic Program today posted its updated statement on cloning and organic livestock production.

TK: I would think that the majority of livestock producers would favor labeling of cloned meat or milk, since they would not want to be painted with the same brush of consumer unease when food from cloned animals makes its way to the market place. Here is a piece in The Los Angeles Times that already gives reaction from retailers who say they will not carry food from cloned animals. Can a "clone free" label be far behind?

On user fees and traceability

David Acheson, assistant commissioner for food protection for the FDA, meets with reporters after his Jan. 14 session in New Orleans.

After the session, I asked him about the idea of charging each food facility an annual registration fee that would be used to help fund the cost of food safety inspections. Some consumer groups are lining up behind that proposal as a way to provide resources to the FDA. Those groups believe that an annual registration inherently has less conflict of interest than a fee for service approach.

Acheson said that the FDA's Food Protection plan mentions two fees, and both are fees for service. "We haven't taken a position on user fees per se, but at the end fo the day we will have to have resources and it is up to everybody about where to generate resources," he told me.

Acheson also praised the produce industry for "stepping up to the plate" for their efforts to make traceability work. While the FDA would like to prevent future outbreaks rather than react to them, he said traceability is a critical component to limit damage to an industry if an outbreak does happen.

Meanwhile, here are highlights from a joint press release from PMA, CPMA and United about the traceability steering committee:

The steering committee of the Produce Traceability Initiative, an industry-led effort to adopt traceability throughout the produce supply chain, met for the first time Jan. 9 in Atlanta to develop an action plan for establishing industry traceability best practices and goals for their adoption and accountability.
The initiative was launched in October 2007 by Produce Marketing Association (PMA), Canadian Produce Marketing Association (CPMA), and United Fresh Produce Association (United Fresh). It is guided by a steering committee of more than 30 companies with balanced representation from the buying and selling community, including participants from all segments of the supply chain.

During its first meeting, chaired by Food Lion LLC Chief Operating Officer Cathy Green and facilitated by Perishables Group Executive Vice President Steve Lutz, the committee addressed a broad range of traceability issues facing the produce industry today. Overall, the group concluded that systematic and consistent application of common standards across the supply chain is needed to enhance chain-wide traceability, building the next critical step beyond many of the excellent internal traceability systems that exist within many different companies.

The committee reached agreement on four key elements for implementing industry-wide traceability standards.

First, the group confirmed past industry support that the GS1 produce traceability standard developed by the international standards organization GS1 (formerly known as EAN-UCC) is the most efficient worldwide approach to achieve system-wide (i.e., both internal and external) traceability, and should be widely adopted as the produce industry standard.

Second, it was agreed that a formal industry timeline for adoption of standards is needed. Steering committee participants agreed to begin evaluating what might be required to implement GS1 standards within their own operations, and will report back at the next committee meeting on recommended implementation timelines.

Third, the committee agreed to discuss ways in which companies could best show their support and commitment to adoption.

Fourth, the group agreed that traceability standards should be adopted at the case level initially, as the backbone of supply chain traceability. However, the committee encourages companies to move toward item-level coding as feasible, as many produce products are now packaged for the consumer, thereby offering a viable option for providing traceability to the item level.

The steering committee will meet next in February or March to form subcommittees that will address specific elements, such as setting timelines for adoption.

TK: No huge surprises with the traceability steering committee's first meeting. It will be significant, as subcommittees meet in February and March, if the group can quickly produce a timetable for adoption of traceability implementation.