What we eat: "Junk food" providers make for an easy whipping boy, but the truth is we overeat everything, writes Dr Michael J Gibney
The current rapid rise in the proportion of the population that is obese is a hot topic for which a culprit must be found and the food industry fulfils all the necessary criteria for such. When people talk about obesity and the food industry, I get the impression that they are not talking about the potato farmers of Co Meath or their local fish and chip shop or their local pub.
No, when obesity and the food industry are mentioned in the same breath, it is corporate food industry that is targeted - Coca-Cola, Nestlé, Unilever, Danone, Kraft and our own corporate food industry to a lesser extent, Kerry, Glanbia, Batchelors.
Such corporate culprits are unloved and are very attractive whipping boys. It may make us feel good to growl at them, but it is never going to solve the problem. The joint research of UCD, TCD and UCC, funded by the Irish taxpayer, shows that there is no single food or food category, the consumption of which is linked to overweight and obesity. We overeat everything.
The fact that we overeat on potatoes, meat, milk, bread, fish and chips, sandwiches and beer is largely var roles = "IrelandComAuthor";// Disallow raw HTML Edit if user roles do not permit...if (roles.indexOf('IrelandComAdmin') == -1&& roles.indexOf('IrelandComHtmlEdit') == -1) {document.getElementById('ITArticle:summary').readOnly = true;document.getElementById('ITArticle:body').readOnly = true;}ignored in favour of the "fast food" or "junk food" whipping boy.
Until that thorny and complex task is grasped, the real issue of over-eating on everything is ignored. My colleague Prof Pat Wall talks of the new BSE epidemic - blame someone else.
Almost inevitably, when nutrition and industry are mentioned together comes the next problem: food labelling. Again, only a small fraction of the food supply is labelled. We don't label trout or turnips or tomatoes. We cannot label the food service sector - pubs, delis, restaurants and takeaways, which together account for 25 per cent of our energy intake. So whatever problem we solve with labelling, and we certainly can help consumers here, we again have to recognise that we have only addressed a fraction of the food supply.
Consumer research on the use of labels and nutrition knowledge reveals some interesting findings. Very few people use labels to make nutrition-related food choices and among those who do use labels, it is mainly to avoid foods containing ingredients that disagree with them. The label is seen by many as a route to knowledge transmission and imparting knowledge is seen as the bottleneck in consumers choosing a healthier diet.
Not so, I am afraid. Survey after survey across the EU shows that when asked unprompted to define healthy eating, the vast majority have a pretty good idea. When asked about the need to improve their diet, a majority (65 to 75 per cent) will declare that they don't need to so as their diet is already healthy enough.
Campaigns at changing healthy food choices are falling on deaf ears and the research that might improve this communication remains unused.
"Most Irish people think their diet is healthy. Most are very wrong in that opinion." Now that's something I would like to see on billboards.
The dominance that the obesity issue has on nutrition and health diverts attention from other very important, perhaps equally important issues. Ireland has the lowest rate of breastfeeding in Europe. If we cannot foster a social set of values that gives babies what they are nutritionally entitled to, what on earth chance have we of generating a favourable attitude to healthy eating in adulthood? One in 10 two year-olds has anaemia, which tells us that our infant-feeding practices are nothing to be proud of.
We have quite serious problems with vitamin D levels and we have a growing burden of brittle-bone disease. These are just examples of the breadth of the challenges to public health nutrition beyond obesity.
So what is the way forward?
The first step is to use the resources which the taxpayer has funded and ensure that the programmes of action reflect reality, reality here in Ireland and not someone's favourite hunch.
Two examples will illustrate. There have been calls to ban vending machines from primary schools. In our children's survey, we didn't find a school with a vending machine. Eating outside the home is a contributory factor to the problem of obesity, we are told. Our survey shows that 94 per cent of calories consumed are home-based, so the problem is inside the home, not outside. Secondly, we need to recognise that the problem is far more complex than is popularly portrayed and that any solution to the epidemic of obesity will, as was pointed out by the UK Audit Office on the subject, require several generations to solve.
There is simply no quick fix.
The third step is to call in the bean counters and ascertain the cost of really serious health promotion programmes stitched right into all social partnership agreements against the savings that would be made in reducing risk factors for chronic disease.
The final step is to get the right balance between regulation and innovation. We can write laws to oblige the food industry to do whatever we want, but we must remember that in so doing, we are denying the consumer choice and it will be argued that consumers have the right to eat wrongly. Short of regulation are partnerships between the regulator and the food sector, and an excellent example is the current programme that the Food Safety Authority of Ireland has with the processed food sector in reducing salt levels in foods.
Innovation is vitally important in improving nutrient balance. Our intake of saturated fat has fallen by nearly 30 per cent in the last two decades through innovation in the spreads and milk sectors, and functional foods such as phytosterol- enriched margarines that lower blood cholesterol also contribute to the solution. In effect, it is easier to change the properties of foods than to change food preference, although both need to be addressed
Slowly, the food supply is turning to the needs of the consumer rather that the capacity of the producer and in that regard The Irish Times' "What we eat" series is to be welcomed as a means of increasing awareness of food and health.
Michael J Gibney is professor of food and health at University College Dublin