Food stopped being simply the substance that gives us energy and the nutrients we need to survive, and [rapidly] evolved into a product to sell sell sell. Forget survival of the fittest. Industry doesn't care about health fitness. It cares about financial fitness, which translates into maximizing profits, minimizing costs, and doing whatever else it takes to do just that, including constantly keeping your attention [and wallet] open, by developing new products [note: the avg. supermarket now has about 60,000 products, up from about 20,000, just decades ago], packaging, marketing, so on and so forth.In efforts to somehow manage and regulate this crazy food processing, which continues full-force today, the food label was born— telling us what's in an unnatural, unrecognizable, processed food and some key nutrient information, including:
- Calories
- Fat [unsaturated, saturated, trans]
- Cholesterol
- Sodium
- Potassium
- Carbs
- Fiber
- Sugar
- Protein
- Calcium
- Iron
- Vitamins A and C
- Ingredients in descending order by weight
Phew. That's a lot of really useful information on nearly every packaged food you can lay your hands on.
But forget all that. In the next few months, food makers [will] devise [their] own label plan, which consists of listing calories, saturated fat, sodium, and sugar on the front of packages, with the option to include [ahem, market] one or two more 'positive' ingredients as well, such as fiber.
Is the food industry really making genuine efforts to help consumers make healthier choices, as they claim?
And, more importantly, will consumers know how to use this new label plan any more effectively than what is on packages already?
And note: to say that the current food label is hidden, is bogus [or, complete BS]. Think for a minute: Do children have a difficult time finding games on their cereal boxes? [Case and point.]
Like an unknown foreign language, you can present the same information in a million different ways, but you still need an education or translator.
Happy Healthy Juicy $50 Million for Nutrition Education Just Might Prove More Effective Than Advertising This Initiative!
I do not like the new labeling system as there are key things that I look for like protein that may be excluded. I know it states they have the option of showing one or two addtionial ingrediants, why bother is what I think when they can lie about content. The labeling system needs to continue to be regulated by the governement.
ReplyDeleteWhen private companies are able to list what ever they deem important, they are more likely covering up the fact that they use fillers or ten rats fell in the batch. I don't agree with this and I feel there is no need for it. Alneica Radcliffe
I personally think that food labels are read more often than they used to be but I don't believe people understand everything they are reading. Unless you actually sit down and analyze what you are eating all together in relation to what each individual food label reflects, you don't really realize that you are lacking or sometimes taking in too much of one thing, i.e. sodium. I don't think food labels are hard to read, let alone hard to find, but sometimes they are actually non existent. I think that if they are going to add an additional label on the product, people might only refer to that and neglect other important item or even get confused. I think the industry needs to focus more on what is better for the consumer and not for their wallet.
ReplyDeletewell after reading this article, and to give my own point of view, i think these manufacturing industries should value the health of consumers rather than care more about the money they are making from selling their products. Being educated about the kind of foods we eat is very important and will help consumers make better choices about the kind of food they consume.
ReplyDeleteGene-BIO 210
ReplyDeleteThe article encapsulates a key point regarding the national food suppliers that are over saturating the food market with an enormity amount of processed foods. The population has too many choices for cheap, unhealthy process foods. There is not enough emphasis on the recommended daily intake of the nutrients with need to maintain a healthy lifestyle. Additionally, with the state of the economy more people are looking for the cheaper product rather than natural, organic food products that cost more, albeit are beneficial to our well being in the long run.
I like how this site talks about food labels and calories.
ReplyDeleteFood labels are read by persons who are already health conscious. They have an idea of what their daily intake of nutrients etc. ought to be. Revamping labels will not change the eating habits of persons who ought to be mindful of foods they consume. On the other hand, I think time should be spent educating children as early as pre-school age the benefits of healthy diet,and nutrition. There's a saying that goes knowledge is power!
ReplyDeleteFood,for the most part is culturally based. We learn how to prepare food from parents, grandparents, great-grandparents. Often times, nutrition is not included in recipies of persons who are economically challenged or persons from developing countries. The main goal is to alleviate hunger and to satisfy taste buds. Nutrition education would better serve to help persons make healthy choices.
Honestly, I don't think that putting new labels on the front of food packages would make any difference. As this article stated itself, it's bogus because the label on packages right now isn't hidden. The new labelling would just make the food industry profits raise sky high not caring about the customers wallets by developing new products which we dont even need.
ReplyDeleteI feel very neutral about the changing of the food labeling. I wished the FDA were a true force to reckon with and more reliable when it really matters. The FDA has failed us at times with its bureaucracy and political favoritism. If you leave the nutrition labels up to these huge corporations, their marketing departments will somehow eschew the truth. For instance, the company POM which was involved in a controversy with exaggerated claims on their bottles. It is surprising that the FDA was even involved in debunking POM’s overinflated “health” claims. This makes me wonder what they did: whether they angered their competition or someone at the FDA. I wish more food companies are put on the spotlight and stricter regulations are enforced on all the food companies and their labeling. Not to mention the restaurant business. I really appreciated when New York City banned all artificial trans fat in all restaurants and they have to list the calories from each item in the menu. Although many can argue that no one looks at the food labels, those who are trying to be health conscious have the information readily available to them. The rest of the nation should follow NYC’s example and implement these things in the restaurant business. People have the right to know the amount of calories they could be potentially consuming. They should have this information readily available as long as it is not in microscopic small print on the package. The bigger the font, the better.
ReplyDeletehttp://cspinet.org/new/200609262.html
I agree with many of the comments here that state that food labels are only read by those whom are already health conscious. I'd guess a big percentage of Americans don't bother to glance at the labels and corporations are racking in tons of money on that very fact. For decades they've always had the "if it taste good they will buy" mentality. It's sad but true, people will buy it just because it taste better.
ReplyDeleteFor example, take cold breakfast cereals. I'm sure most people choose Kelloggs over American Choice cereal anyday. they pay the extra $2 - $3 dollars just for the better taste, however they do not notice the label.
If you compare you would notice that cheaper cereals like American Choice or Qaker oats are not only cheaper, but they have a lot less sugar. People don't realize that the "better" taste is worse for you're body's system.
I believe the corporation who makes labels simplier to read like the extra in the article above will actually attract more people. They can still make the big bucks and be socially/health productive if they take the time to realize it.