Next week residents of Berkeley, California, will decide whether to place a penny-an-ounce tax on sugary beverages, writes Mother Jones. The beverage industry has fought off similar taxes and restrictions in every American city where they’ve been proposed, but it has never faced a more formidable challenge than it does in this overwhelmingly liberal and well-educated college town. The soda fight is, if nothing else, a case study in whether truckloads of cash can sway a politically engaged citizenry.
World Trade Organization Rules Against Popular U.S. Country-of-Origin Meat Labels on Which Consumers Rely
Cross Posted from Public Citizen
Compliance Panel Says U.S. Policy Still Violates WTO Despite Changes Made to Comply With 2012 WTO Order; U.S. Should Not Change COOL Policy
(The recent) ruling by a World Trade Organization (WTO) compliance panel against U.S country-of-origin meat labeling (COOL) policies sets up a no-win dynamic, and the Obama administration should appeal the ruling, Public Citizen said.
If the administration were to weaken COOL, U.S. consumers would lose access to critical information about where their meat comes from at a time when consumer interest in such information is at an all-time high and opposition would only grow to the administration’s beleaguered trade agenda. If the administration again were to seek to comply with the WTO by strengthening COOL, then Mexico and Canada – the two countries that challenged the policy – likely would continue their case, even though cattle imports from Canada have increased since the 2013 strengthening of the policy.
The ruling further complicates the Obama administration’s stalled efforts to obtain Fast Track trade authority for two major agreements, the Trans-Pacific Partnership and the Trans-Atlantic Free Trade Agreement. Both of these pacts would expose the United States to more such challenges against U.S. consumer, environmental and other policies.
“Many Americans will be shocked that the WTO can order our government to deny U.S. consumers the basic information about where their food comes from and that if the information policy is not gutted, we could face millions in sanctions every year,” said Lori Wallach, director of Public Citizen’s Global Trade Watch. “Today’s ruling spotlights how these so called ‘trade’ deals are packed with non-trade provisions that threaten our most basic rights, such as even knowing the source and safety of what’s on our dinner plate.”
The WTO compliance panel decided that changes made in May 2013 to the original U.S. COOL policy in an effort to make it comply with a 2012 WTO ruling against the law are not acceptable and that the modified U.S. COOL policy still constitutes a “technical barrier to trade.” The panel decided that the strengthened COOL policy afforded less favorable treatment to cattle and hog imports from Canada and Mexico, despite a 52 percent increase in U.S. imports of cattle from Canada under the modified policy. The panel stated that the alleged difference in treatment did not “stem exclusively from legitimate regulatory distinctions.”
The United States has one chance to appeal this decision before the WTO issues a final, binding ruling. Under WTO rules, if the U.S. appeal fails, Canada and Mexico would be authorized to impose indefinite trade sanctions against the United States unless or until the U.S. government changes or eliminates the popular labeling policy.
Today’s ruling follows a string of recent WTO rulings against popular U.S. consumer and environmental policies. In May 2012, the WTO ruled against voluntary “dolphin-safe” tuna labels that, by allowing consumers to choose to buy tuna caught without dolphin-killing fishing practices, have helped to dramatically reduce dolphin deaths. In April 2012, the WTO ruled against a U.S. ban on clove-, candy- and chocolate-flavored cigarettes, enacted to curb youth smoking. In each of those cases, U.S. policy changes made to comply with the WTO’s decisions also have been challenged before WTO panels similar to the one that issued today’s ruling.
“The WTO again ruling against a popular U.S. consumer protection will just spur the growing public and congressional concerns about the big Pacific and European trade deals the administration is now pushing and the Fast Track authority to railroad through Congress more agreements that undermine basic consumer rights,” said Wallach.
Background
The COOL policy was created when Congress enacted mandatory country-of-origin labeling for meat – supported by 92 percent of the U.S. public in a recent poll – in the 2008 farm bill. This occurred after 50 years of U.S. government experimentation with voluntary labeling and efforts by U.S. consumer groups to institute a mandatory program.
In their successful challenge of COOL at the WTO, Canada and Mexico claimed that the program violated WTO limits on what sorts of product-related “technical regulations” signatory countries are permitted to enact. The initial WTO ruling was issued in November 2011. Canada and Mexico demanded that the United States drop its mandatory labels in favor of a return to a voluntary program or standards set by an international food standards body in which numerous international food companies play a central role. Neither option would offer U.S. consumers the same level of information as the current labels. The United States appealed.
The WTO Appellate Body sided with Mexico and Canada in a June 2012 ruling against COOL. The U.S. government responded to the final WTO ruling by altering the policy in a way that fixed the problems identified by the WTO tribunal. However, instead of watering down the popular program as Mexico and Canada sought, the U.S. Department of Agriculture responded with a rule change in May 2013 that strengthened the labeling regime. The new policy provided more country-of-origin information to consumers, which satisfied the issues raised in the WTO’s ruling. However, Mexico and Canada then challenged the new U.S. policy. With today’s ruling, the WTO has announced its support for the Mexican and Canadian contention that the U.S. law is still not consistent with the WTO rules.
A Million Ways to Die in the U.S.
In a commentary entitled A Million Ways to Die in the U.S. on the Daily Show, noted public health analyst John Stewart asks why America is eager to take action on threats to health from abroad but unwilling to act on those hazards manufactured in the US of A.
Public Policies and the Risk Factors for NCDs in Brazil
At the Todo Juntos Contra O Cancer (Together Against Cancer) conference in Sao Paulo, Brazil last week, several presenters explored the role of the food, alcohol and tobacco industries in non-communicable diseases in Brazil and elsewhere. The moderator of the panel was Claudia Collucci, a reporter for Folha de Sao Paulo, a major Brazilian newspaper. The panel at this session included:
Professor Carlos A. Monteiro, Department of Nutrition, School of Public Health, University of Sao Paulo, who spoke on Ultra-processed foods and health, exploring the need for public policies to reduce the proportion of calories derived from ultra-processed foods;
Dr. Maristela Monteiro, Senior Advisor for Alcohol and Substance Abuse at the Pan American Health Organization, who spoke on Alcohol as a risk factor for public health in the Americas , an overview of the burden of disease imposed by alcohol and the policies used to reduce this burden.
Paula Johns, Executive Director, ACT – Alliance for the Control of Tobacco Use, Brazil, who spoke on Success and challenges in tobacco control, a look at the challenges faced and strategies employed to curb smoking prevalence in Brazil.
Nicholas Freudenberg, Distinguished Professor of Public Health at City University of New York, who spoke on Changing the Practices of the Tobacco, Alcohol, Automotive, and Food Industries to Prevent Noncommunicable Diseases, an examination of the role of corporate business and political practices on NCDs.
Food Companies Should Obtain Legal Protection to Look Beyond Profit
Re-posted from Al Jazeera
In a marketplace full of greenwashing, I often scoff at the various certification programs that allow for-profit businesses to promote themselves as being sustainable or otherwise socially responsible.
But a closer look at a certification dubbed B Corp suggests real promise. Companies with B Corp certification are for-profit ones that meet certain public benefit standards. The private certification is offered by a nonprofit called B Lab, which uses a point system to assess companies in the areas of governance, workers, community and the environment. Businesses that gain the certification can place the B Corp logo on its marketing materials — like the Fair Trade label for coffee.
These B Corporations (which undergo the aforementioned private certification process) are not to be confused with benefit corporations (a legal status for for-profit companies allowed in certain states). But the rising popularity of B Corporations and the growing number of states — in just a few years, 27 — that have passed laws allowing benefit status, are related.
Forbes.com explained the advantages of the legal designation, saying, “Incorporating as a benefit corporation legally protects an entrepreneur’s social goals by mandating considerations other than just profit.” In other words, including social responsibility in a company’s legal status allows flexibility for companies that care about more than just the bottom line.
The same philosophy — of prioritizing positive social and environmental practices — guides certified B Corporations. And last month they got a big boost with the promise of $4 million in investment money from the venture-capital firm Collaborative Fund and CircleUp, a funding platform for nontech startups. CircleUp previously raised more than $10 million in investment funds for B Corporations, including $2.38 million for Peeled Snacks, an all-organic dried fruit company.
This shift toward social responsibility is especially important for food companies. As I’ve argued for years, even if a food corporation might want to sell healthier foods or stop marketing to children, it can’t because it is bound by the legal requirement of prioritizing shareholders, which means maximizing profit. And profit too often means selling poor-quality foods, paying workers low wages or harming the environment.
Getting Big Food on board
Several food companies have decided to incorporate as legally recognized benefit corporations, including one recently bought out by Big Food. Plum Organics, which makes food products for children, was purchased by Campbell Soup Co. last year, making it the first B Corporation to be a wholly owned subsidiary of a publicly traded company. While Plum Organic has been a certified B Corp since 2008, the company took legal steps to become a benefit corporation in Delaware last year after the state passed legislation recognizing that status.
Plum CEO Neil Grimmer explained for Co.Exist the importance of the legal change, saying, “When these ideas become inscribed in your corporate bylaws, it becomes the compass of the company. Now more than ever that’s part of our charter.” The company is also helping Campbell get recommended as a good investment.
According to Grimmer, Campbell embraced the idea of Plum’s becoming a benefit corporation. That a leading food company not only tolerates but also embraces the benefit model signals potential for more positive change. With Big Food increasingly buying out organic companies — General Mills, for instance, is about to buy organic food company Annie’s — the benefit corporation could help prevent the potential diluting of values.
While Plum Organic’s mission is focused mainly on ingredients, other benefit corporations emphasize the importance of its workers. Given that food workers are often paid slave wages and otherwise exploited, could the benefit corporation be a path to improving working conditions? One company that thinks so is Greyston Bakery, which in 2012 became New York’s first benefit corporation.
Greyston, which also has B Corp certification, prides itself on its open hiring system, in which anyone who wants a job can get one, regardless of experience and despite any history of “homelessness, incarceration, substance abuse, welfare dependence, domestic violence or illiteracy.” All the company’s profits go to the Greyston Foundation, which operates several self-sufficiency programs in the company’s community of Yonkers, New York. But the bakery’s biggest claim to fame may be that it’s a supplier (30,000 pounds of brownies daily) for Ben and Jerry’s, another certified B Corp. Greyston scored an impressive 133 out of 200 on B Lab’s assessment. In a sign that B Lab’s questionnaire encourages improvement, Greyston increased its score by 35 percent between its 2011 and 2013 audits. In addition to creating good jobs, the bakery has installed solar panels and purchases sustainable cocoa and sugar.
Other food companies that have attained B Corp certification include the Better Bean Co., Revolution Foods, Numi Organic Tea, Nutiva, Guayaki and Happy Family (another baby food company). B Lab has certified 1,000 businesses in 33 countries. So far, most certified B Corporations are small. But with the growth of the organic and natural food industry surpassing conventional food’s, it could only be a matter of time before existing B Corps grow and big corporations start to realize the economic value of joining the movement.
Increasing the scope
Benefit corporations are held accountable mainly in the same way as traditional corporations — through their shareholders. But they also have additional reporting requirements.
“Benefit corporations have a higher level of transparency than any other business form because they must produce an annual benefit report made available to the public,” B Lab’s policy director, Erik Trojian told me.
B Corp certification, which must be renewed every two years, raises the accountability bar even more by providing a third-party assessment. (Companies must score at least 80 out of 200 possible points to get certified. Trojian said the typical corporation in the United States would score 35 to 40.)
But there is still a ways to go. B Lab’s assessment tool doesn’t cover certain important societal issues. I was disappointed to learn, for example, that it doesn’t assess companies’ marketing practices. As I’ve written, companies shouldn’t market to children because a child cannot understand how marketing works, making the practice exploitive. A food company designated as a benefit corporation could refuse to do so; the decision would certainly qualify as a material positive impact on society — one of the criteria for being a benefit corporation. Other important issues could include animal welfare, disclosure of ingredients (such as those hidden by euphemisms like “natural flavors”) and even lobbying that undermines democracy.
It remains to be seen if benefit corporation laws and private certifications such as B Corp will have broader positive effects on the food system. The growing interest in and support of big companies such as Campbell is a positive sign. Moreover, removing an important legal barrier to caring about more than just profit is a great first step.
Climate Change, Food and Health: Taking Action to Address Root Causes
The “good” news is that three of the world’s most serious threats —human-induced climate change, accelerating epidemics of chronic diseases, and growing food insecurity — have common causes and therefore potentially common solutions. The 2014 Climate Summit at the United Nations later this month provides an opportunity for scientists, government leaders, activists and concerned citizens from around the world to examine these common causes and identify the actions we can take to modify the underlying causes of these intersecting crises.
What are these common roots? Our economy’s continued dependence on fossil fuels ensures that carbon continues to accumulate, accelerating rising global temperatures and their impact on weather, climate and human well-being. The global energy industry from Exxon to BP to Gazprom uses its economic and political power to thwart widespread implementation of alternatives. Evidence shows that coal plays an especially important role in climate change yet countries like China, the United States and others continue to support coal production. According to Greenpeace, the fossil fuel industry is planning 14 massive coal, oil and gas projects that would produce as much new carbon dioxide emissions in 2020 as the entire US, and delay action on climate change for more than a decade.
Hyperconsumption describes lifestyles and health behaviors that put people at risk of premature death and preventable chronic illnesses. Each year the tobacco, alcohol and processed food industries spend billions of dollars aggressively promoting their products around the world, despite the World Health Organization’s finding that increased consumption of tobacco, alcohol and unhealthy food are primary drivers of growing rates of chronic diseases, today’s leading global killers. The production and distribution practices of the food, alcohol and tobacco industries contribute to global warming and also magnify global health inequalities.
Autocentrism is the irrational promotion of automobiles as the main mode of human transportation. Despite growing evidence that active transportation like walking and bicycling and mass transitcontribute to more physical activity, better health, fewer emissions of carbon and other pollutants, and people-friendlier cities and towns, the automobile industry and the governments that support it resist pursuing alternatives at a scale that can achieve their benefits.
Industrial agriculture describes the transformation of food production from small and medium size farmers and manufacturers to a system where giant multinational corporations like Monsanto, Cargill, Coca Cola, McDonald’s, Nestle and Walmart control every stage of our food system from patented seeds, monoculture farming, and integrated distribution to global marketing and retail outlets. Industrial agriculture insists that the bottom line is their profit, not human need. Its practices on fertilizers, transportation, meat production and global trade contribute to carbon emissions, diet-related diseases and food insecurity.
One reason that climate change, chronic disease and food insecurity have worsened in recent decades is that the industries involved and business and international trade associations they have created have coordinated a massive effort to roll back regulations that protect public health and the environment and discredit the science that documents the dangers the world faces.
Underlying these trends has been the growing concentration of wealth and power in the hands of corporations and the moneyed interests that own and control them. The synergistic impact of these developments has been a rise in inequality and declines in democracy, developments that make it harder to propose and mobilize public support for alternative policies.
Some who agree on the magnitude of the threats and the evidence on common causes of climate change, premature deaths from chronic diseases and growing food insecurity are reluctant to act because they believe the problems are too big and complex and the perpetrators too powerful to make change possible. But the acceleration of each of these problems results from human decisions made over the course of the last few decades. And what people decide in one time, they can change in another.
To the chorus of the powerful that there is no alternative to the status quo the response of the majority must be that another world is possible. By encouraging public discussion of the common roots of climate change, chronic diseases and food insecurity, we can begin to shine a light on the actions that will lead us to that other world.
Every generation is judged by the world we leave our children and grandchildren. The decisions we make in the years to come will determine whether our legacy is shortened lifespans, growing hunger, and further deterioration of the environment that supports life. Or we can decide that our gift will be better health, food security and a more sustainable planet. The choice is ours.
Another World is Possible
For more information, read the recent Lancet summary on climate change and health and Chapter 7 on food security and Chapter 11 on Human Health from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, 2014.
Assessing the Health Impact of Burger King’s Acquisition of Tim Horton’s
Last month, the U.S. fast food corporation Burger King (BK) announced that it planned to buy Tim Horton’s, the Canadian coffee and doughnut chain for $11 billion to create the world’s second largest fast food chain. Media and political commentary on the deal has focused on BK’s decision to move the merged company to Canada, a so-called tax inversion that can lower BK’s tax rate. U.S. Senator Sherrod Brown (Dem-Ohio) called the decision unpatriotic and urged Americans to boycott BK. “Burger King’s decision to abandon the United States means consumers should turn to Wendy’s Old Fashioned Hamburgers or White Castle sliders,” companies that happen to be based in Ohio, said Brown. “To help business grow in America, taxpayers have funded public infrastructure, workforce training and incentives to encourage [research and development] and capital investment. Runaway corporations benefited from those policies but want US companies to pay their share of the tab.”
Fast Food Goes Global
But BK, like other fast food companies, had already become a global corporation, with closer ties to international capital than any government. The financial shenanigans leading up to the acquisition illustrate the globalization of the fast food industry. In 2002, Bain Capital, TPG Capital and Goldman Sachs Capital Partners took BK public. In 2010, however, they sold off a majority stake to 3G Capital, a Brazilian private equity firm. By 2012, according to the Guardian, the company’s profits had fallen in half and 3G pushed BK to go public again. It used a merger with an already public shell company Justice Holdings, to expedite the public offering. The Brazilian 3G Capital will be the owner of the new company, in which BK will continue to be based in Miami and Tim Horton’s in Oakville, Ontario. 3G also owns Heinz, another multinational processed food company that brags about being “famous for our iconic brands on six continents.” A major investor in both BK and Heinz (as well as in Dairy Queen) is the billionaire investor Warren Buffett of Berkshire Hathaway.
Both BK and Horton’s have a global presence. BK has approximately 12,000 outlets in the U.S. and 73 countries and U.S. territories worldwide. Tim Horton’s operates in Canada and the US. In 2011, it signed an agreement with a company based in Dubai to open up to 120 multi-format restaurants in markets in the Middle East.
Health impact of acquisition
How might the BK/Horton’s marriage affect population health? In the absence of data, only informed speculation is possible. In general, market concentration shifts power away from consumers to producers. It allows bigger companies to spend more on marketing and research and development, activities carried out to further consolidate market share and enhance profitability. For these two companies, whose business depends on selling inexpensive high calorie, low nutrient food to people around the world, expansion means reaching more eaters with products known to contribute to obesity, diabetes and other diet-related diseases.
For BK, the acquisition offers an opportunity to cash in on the only growing sector of the fast food market—take out breakfast. Adding Tim Horton’s will allow BK to compete more with a main rival, Dunkin Donuts, the only fast food company that has not lost customers in recent years, according to Harry Balzer, vice-president of the NPK Group. Like other fast food companies, BK hopes to gain round the clock stomach share for fast food. Compared to other fast food meals, breakfast has even more potential to add calories, fat, sugar and salt to consumers’ diets since it replaces the often healthier home alternatives.
Concentration also gives industries more leeway to compete on price since they can achieve economies of scale and afford to lower prices in order to drive smaller competitors out of business. By making its energy-dense nutrient-poor fare more affordable to low income populations, the new company may further contribute to already high inequalities in diet-related disease among the poor and the better off.
The sad truth is that today no local, national or global organization has the mandate, resources or commitment for assessing the health impact of mergers or acquisitions like the one between Burger King and Tim Horton’s. Until that changes, we can expect these deals will continue to be good for profits but bad for public health.
Coca Cola and Monster: Open Happiness Teams up with Meanest Energy Drink on the Planet
- Credit: Bloomberg Businessweek
Last week, Coca Cola, the world’s largest soda company, paid $2.15 billion to buy a minority share in the energy drink maker Monster Beverages, the Number 2 energy drink maker in the United States. The deal, which also includes a trade of brands between the two companies, provides a useful illustration of what happens when big companies get worried about falling revenues. The Wall Street Journal called Coke’s purchase of a 16.7% stake in Monster “a risky bid to jolt sagging sales”, noting that “Coke badly needs some big new ideas” after a third straight year of sagging global sales.
What makes energy drinks so attractive? Last year Monster’s revenues rose 9% to $2.2. billion and its deal with Coke may allow it edge out Red Bull, the nation’s largest energy drink maker. The stake in Monster gives Coca Cola a chance to become dominant in another part of the drinks market, a sector that until recently was expanding even as soda sales fell. In recent months, Coca Cola has struggled to change its image. As Businessweek noted recently, “Coke (has been) on the wrong side of just about every consumer lifestyle trend.” The new head of Coke’s North American division, Sandy Douglas was hired to reverse Coke’s declining sales. His goal is to refocus the company on the one thing it does best: sell bottles of Coke. This is the beginning, he says, of “what I might call the phased relaunch of Coca-Cola in the U.S.” But will buying Monster contribute to that goal?
In buying a stake in Monster, Coca Cola risks adding to its reputation as one of the world’s leading contributors to obesity, diabetes and other diet related disease an additional set of health concerns. A 2009 article in Drug and Alcohol Dependence warned that caffeinated energy drinks present growing health problems—include caffeine intoxication and dependence and a gateway to dependence on other drugs. A 2014 report from the CDC shows that energy drinks contain caffeine that ranges from 50 mg to 500 mg per can or bottle and other ingredients that claim to boost energy. Used in excess, they can lead to elevated blood pressure and dehydration because of their high caffeine content. The American Academy of Pediatrics in 2011 recommended that because the stimulants in energy drinks, they should never be consumed by children or adolescents. Earlier this summer, the Center for Science in the Public Interest released a report showing that the FDA had learned of 276 adverse events related to energy drinks since 2004, including 34 deaths. Eleven of these deaths were linked to Monster drinks.
In choosing to buy a stake in Monster, Coca Cola stakes its future on dominating beverage industry sectors that contribute most to global health problems. Faced with a choice between products that have the potential to hook customers and healthier, less addictive or habituating alternatives, food and beverage companies—like tobacco and alcohol corporations– have consistently chosen to invest in products that keep their customers coming back for more.
In a society where government agencies fulfilled their mandate to protect public health against private profit, Coke’s strategy could be risky. But history shows that Coca Cola’s optimism that regulators will not dent their profits is based on experience. In 1981, reports Leonid Bershidsky in Bloomberg News, it was Pepsi Cola that convinced the FDA that caffeine was a “flavor enhancer”, not regulated by the agency, rather than a psychoactive ingredient which could have been regulated as a drug. Now Coca Cola spends $4.8 million a year on lobbying, more than twice as much as Pepsi, to make sure Congress heeds its regulatory and other concerns.
The bottom line is that Coke’s decision to invest in Monster connects it to another product associated with premature death and aggressive and deceptive marketing. For those who wonder whether Coca Cola’s decision to improve its image represents a public relations ploy or a serious effort to scale back its damage to the health of the world’s population, the decision to invest in Monster provides a clear answer.
Calories, sugar, sodium and caffeine in Coca Cola and two Monster Beverage products, Peace Tea and Monster Energy Drink.
| Product | Size ounces | Calories | Sugar gms | Sodium mgs | Caffeine mgs | Ingredients |
| Coca Cola | 20 | 240 | 65 | 75 | 58 | Carbonated water, high fructose corn syrup, caramel color, phosphoric acid, natural flavors, caffeine. |
| Monster Peace Tea | 24 | 150 | 33-39
By flavor |
60 | 60 | Brewed natural tea (pure filtered water, tea), sugar, apple juice concentrate, lemon juice concentrate, citric acid, natural flavors, sodium citrate, sucralose. |
| Monster Energy | 16 | 200 | 54 | 360 | 160 | l-camitine, glucose, caffeine, guarana, inositol, glucronolactone, maltodextrin |
Who Is Pulling the Strings at the School Nutrition Association?
Why the largest school pizza supplier might be behind the school food lobby’s scuffle with the first lady
Cross-posted from Al Jazeera
As I wrote in June, a bitter fight erupted in Washington, D.C., when the School Nutrition Association (SNA) — representing the nation’s 55,000 school food professionals — decided to oppose nutrition improvements to federally subsidized school meals, claiming that districts face insurmountable challenges from too many changes happening too quickly. Michelle Obama has made the Healthy Hunger-Free Kids Act of 2010 one of her top causes and she is pulling no punches defending the new rules, which require schools to serve lower-sodium and lower-fat meals with more whole grains and fruit and vegetable servings. The result is an unfortunate standoff between the White House and the SNA’s current leadership.
At the trade group’s annual meeting last month in Boston, I searched for clues. Why did the SNA reverse its earlier position supporting healthier school meals? I also wanted to hear directly from workers who have the thankless job of serving millions of schoolchildren every day.
My first inclination was to suspect influence from the SNA’s food industry sponsors; after all, the organization’s largest donors include Domino’s, PepsiCo and General Mills. But walking through the expo hall, it was clear that the food industry is having no problem meeting the new nutrition rules (a sign of how weak they are). “Whole grain blueberry turkey sausage breakfast sticks” from Jimmy Dean pass muster and, according to an account from Mother Jones, so do “toaster waffles with built-in syrup and endless variations on the theme of breaded poultry.”
Asked about the new regulations, the Domino’s rep shrugged them off, saying, “We can turn on a dime.” He proudly told me that the company’s “Smart Slice” pizza was formulated just for schools and even expressed some frustration over the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s previous flip-flops (for example, the USDA changed its policy earlier this year on caps for meat and grains), because companies such as his invest a lot of money in making changes. In other words, it could actually be harmful to some vendors for the USDA to reverse course now.
As for those actually serving the meals, two food service workers — one from Maryland and another from Texas — told me that the nutrition changes were happening too soon, and all at once. But others, such as a team from New Orleans and another from Maine, didn’t understand the SNA’s position; their schools had been serving healthier meals for years, so the changes are no big deal. In other words, some schools may be struggling, but many others are not. It also means that the narrative the SNA is pushing — that the rules are too difficult to meet — may not be the full story.
Success stories
Implementing healthier school meals takes time and effort: It requires the cooperation of everyone — from students to distributors to principals. But it’s certainly quite feasible.
For instance, during a panel I attended, Helen Phillips, senior director of school nutrition at Norfolk Public Schools in Virginia, described her early transition to healthier meals in 2008, when the Institute of Medicine, a scientific advisory body, first released its school nutrition recommendations. She figured it was where the USDA was headed and wanted to get ahead of the game. It took several years to work out the kinks, she explained, but now the program is a great success. The key was to involve students. “I cannot emphasize enough,” she said repeatedly, “the importance of conducting taste-tests with the kids.”
Could the SNA’s flip-flop trace at least partially back to Schwan, a top donor whose pizza products can be found in 75 percent of the nation’s 96,000 K–12 schools?
Similarly, Kiera Butler recently reported for Mother Jones how the director of food service for Cincinnati’s public schools, Jessica Shelly, steered her program toward a $2.7 million profit. Shelly got her produce distributor to create affordable salad bars so that schoolchildren could choose which vegetables they liked.
And success is not just happening in cities. According to Mother Jones, the director of a rural Vermont district where 43 percent of the students are on free or reduced lunch said he “had no problems whatsoever implementing the new changes.” Plenty of other success stories also demonstrate that it can be done.
The changes are largely a function of willpower, and those districts with the right leadership are not only coping, but also thriving, with some going beyond the minimum standards required by the federal government. More than 200 health and children’s organizations, as well as 19 past SNA presidents, also support the federal changes.
So why is the SNA digging in its heels — and picking a fight with the first lady, to boot? Especially when its vendors are already in full compliance and so many of its own members are having such success?
Schwan’s way
The answer may lie — at least partially — in the SNA’s complicated connections with the food industry. Let’s take a closer look at one of SNA’s patrons (and top donors): Schwan. The Minnesota-based company’s pizza products can be found in 75 percent of the nation’s 96,000 K-12 schools. Of course, Schwan’s products meet the new rules, as pictures from its booth boasting “regulation ready” food indicate.
According to the Star Tribune, the company says it has not taken a position on the controversy. But Schwan has a seat on the School Nutrition Foundation’s board (as does PepsiCo); through it, Schwan offers scholarships to SNA members for professional development. More importantly, as the Washington Post explains:
At a 2012 SNA meeting, a Schwan executive and other industry advocates pushed for the group’s leadership to be more aggressive in asking for changes in the school lunch program, according to a person who witnessed the exchange but requested anonymity because he was not authorized to talk about it.
Remember when Congress declared pizza a vegetable? Schwan was behind that too. As the Star Tribune explained in 2011, without pizza sauce counting as a vegetable, schools would have “a difficult time serving pizza without spending more on other vegetables to serve with it — a potential blow to Minnesota’s Schwan Food Co.” On the SNA’s current agenda (PDF) is the removal of the requirement that schools serve a half-cup of either fruit or vegetables to children, which can cause strain on tight school budgets. That sounds exactly like the earlier concern that led to the absurd pizza-sauce-as-vegetable-serving outcome.
Could all this explain the chumminess I witnessed between Schwan and the SNA at the Boston meeting? One of the panelists at the SNA’s policy session was Craig Burkhardt, a lawyer with the group’s new lobbying firm, Barnes and Thornburg (whose clients include the National Rifle Association). Afterward, I noticed that the rep from Schwan was the first to greet Burkhardt, congratulating him on a great job; they obviously knew each other.
So is Schwan behind the SNA flip-flop? Of course, we can’t know for sure. But if one company really does have that much power over an organization whose mission is to “ensure all children have access to healthful school meals,” those battling for healthier school food have a long fight ahead.
Critic of Artificial Sweeteners Pilloried by Industry-backed Scientists
Susan Swithers is no stranger to food industry criticism, writes Chris Young for the Center for Public Integrity. Still, even Swithers was surprised by the way in which the diet food industry attacked a paper she published last summer that raised health concerns about popular sugar substitutes used in snack foods and diet drinks. Perhaps the strongest, most wide-ranging attacks came from the Calorie Control Council, a lesser-known industry group with a penchant for stealthy public relations tactics.
Corporations and Health Watch 
