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A dietitian member of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics, who wishes to remain anonymous, emailed me about PepsiCo’s guide to research interpretation.

PepsiCo sent dietitians this webinar and handout for communicating nutrition science and evaluating studies. I took a look at the handout, which gives a “high quality research” distinction to any studies in which authors have clearly disclosed conflict of interest. So … As long as it’s disclosed, it can be high quality research?  Ok.

The handout: How to Communicate Nutrition Science Effectively.

As a credentialed healthcare professional, you have the power to inspire trust and deepen the general public’s understanding of nutrition through credible scientific communication. Let this guide help you to better understand scientific publications and to improve your effectiveness as a nutrition communicator.

Here’s what got the attention of my reader:

According to PepsiCo, high-quality science requires publication in a reputable, peer-reviewed journal, results based on the totality of evidence, conflicts of interest disclosed, and ethical questions, societal implications, limitations discussed.

This is good advice.

But as noted by my reader, disclosure of conflicts of interest should not be sufficient to determine research quality.

Disclosure is essential, but not enough to resolve the problems of conflict of interest.

As I endlessly repeat in these Monday posts, the recipients of industry funding rarely recognize the risk of undue influence; they did not intend to be influenced, and they believe themselves to be immune from the influence—despite the fact that tons of research shows otherwise.

Food companies fund research for reasons that have everything to do with marketing and little to do with science.  They do not fund research if they think it might show harm from their products.

Yes, this is a complicated issue.  But consider the benefit to PepsiCo from engaging dietitians in this endeavor.

FeedSpot, a group with which I am unfamiliar, has just named FoodPolitics.com as one of the top 60 blogs and websites in food science.  I am honored to be named as #7, and especially because I am in very good company.

I’m thrilled to announce:

COVER REVEAL 🌟🍲 WHAT TO EAT NOW is a thoroughly revised classic, a field guide to food shopping in America, and a treatise on how to eat well and deliciously. Marion Nestle, America’s preeminent nutritionist and a founding figure in American food studies, takes us through the American supermarket in an aisle-by-aisle guide. Above all else, WHAT TO EAT NOW is a defense of real food and of the value of eating deliciously, mindfully, and responsibly. Jacket design Charlotte Grimm, photography Gregory Reid.  In bookstores November 11.  Available for preorder here.

At a glance across the country: Meatpacking plants closed at an unprecedented rate this year, accelerated by a number of factors such as rising livestock costs, workforce shortages, food safety violations and foodborne illnesses, and ongoing industry consolidation.

Here are some examples: of these and others:

• Tyson closes 3 meat plants, lays off 1K workers The food giant plans to shutter its 328,000-square-foot facility in Emporia, Kansas, as well as two cheesesteak factories in Philadelphia.
• Cargill cuts 5% of global workforce after profits decline The move, which will affect approximately 8,000 jobs, comes as the world’s largest private company plans to streamline operations in the face of lower crop prices and challenges in beef.
• Deere lays off more workers at Iowa tractor plant The cuts add to the thousands of jobs eliminated this year as the equipment maker reigns in production to offset a slowdown in demand.
• Butterball to shutter Arkansas turkey plant, lay off 180 workers: The closure adds to a wave of layoffs in the agriculture industry as weaker sales continue to hurt profits across the sector.

The last couple of years have seen lots of these.  It will be interesting to see what happens this year, especially with immigration “reform” looming on the horizon.  Pretty certain: food prices will rise. A lot.

Food Fix broke the news: Jim Jones, FDA Deputy Commissioner for Human Foods , resigned saying that the firings of the staff he had recruited over the last year made his job impossible.

The New York Times quotes Jones. 

They’ve created a real pickle for themselves,” by cutting staff members working on a key priority, Mr. Jones said. “You just can’t do an assessment [of food additives] for free and you can’t ban chemicals by fiat.

But wait!  Maybe you can.

The FDA is an agency of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS).  And that brings me to its new secretary’s astonishing opening statement on his first day on the job.

I’m totally for making chronic disease a national priority for intervention, for getting conflicts of interest out of the FDA, and for focusing on child health.  And for Making America Healthy Again (MAHA).

I am eager to see what he does.

The FDA has long been plagued by cumbersome procedures (many of which do protect the public), conflicts of interest (especially the “revolving door” between the agency and industry), and apparent capture by the industries it is supposed to regulate.

Can RFK Jr address those problems in a way that promotes the public interest?  We shall see.

In the meantime, Jim Jones is being replaced by Kyle Diamantas, a lawyer from the large firm, Jones Day.

Not much is known about Mr. Diamantas, beyond his hunting turkeys with President Trump.

Food Fix quotes Vani Hari, the Food Babe as saying Diamantas “has a lot of Big Food contacts…I think that actually serves him. It puts him in an interesting position because he understands the stakeholders at play….I think that puts him in a good position to figure this out…He gets this issue.”

The nominee to be the new FDA Commissioner,  Martin Makary, has not yet been confirmed.

So much remains uncertain.  I am following all this with great interest.

Update on the chaos

The FDA has now rehired some of the people who were fired (particularly those supported by user fees).  Presumably, Jim Jones remains out.

Thanks to Peter Johnston, a dietitian in Melbourne, Australia, for sending this one.

The study: Huppertz T, Blom L, van Est L, Peters S. Exploring Nutrient-Adequate Sustainable Diet Scenarios That Are Plant-Based but Animal-Optimized. Nutrients. 2025 Jan 18;17(2):343. doi: 10.3390/nu17020343.

Results

• Reducing the amount of meat products in the diet reduced the environmental impact but increased the price.
• On the other hand, when dairy products were reduced or even omitted, the environmental impact of the nutrient-adequate optimized diet did not change notably, but prices increased notably.
• Increasing vegetable or fruit consumption increased price but did not affect the environmental impact nor did it increase the consumption of beans and pulses when kept within realistic levels.

Conflicts of Interest: T.H. is employed by the company FrieslandCampina. L.B. and L.v.E. are employed by Nutrisoft. S.P. is employed by the Dutch Dairy Association (NZO). The funders had no role in the design of the study; in the collection, analyses, or interpretation of data; in the writing of the manuscript; or in the decision to publish the results.

My next forthcoming book is now available for preorder.

I say next, because this one is a bit of a surprise, even to me.  It’s a spinoff from my forthcoming (in September, I think) new and thoroughly revised edition of What to Eat, retitled What to Eat Now—the book I’ve been working on for the last three years.

Here’s what the publisher says about The Fish Counter:

A standalone extract from the newly revised edition of her groundbreaking What to Eat (which is being reissued as What to Eat Now).

Marion Nestle, America’s preeminent nutritionist and the scholar widely credited with establishing the field of modern American food studies, takes us through every aspect of how we grow, market, shop for, store, label, and eat fish in America….
Nestle pulls the curtain back on the complicated routes that fish have to go through to make it to our supermarket fish counter. What is the history of methylmercury contamination in our fish supplies? How have government agencies dealt with it in the past? How have they communicated its dangers to us, and how do they do that now? What should we consider when we think about food safety and fish? How healthy is fish, in fact?

Marion Nestle answers these and many more questions at the heart of how we consume fish. These chapters are a master class for anyone looking to eat more sustainably, mindfully, and with a full awareness of the many complicated factors at play when you’re standing at the fish counter trying to make a decision about what fish you ought to buy for your dinner.

If you scroll down on the Macmillan website for the book, you can see the five other books in the Picador Shorts series on Oceans, Rivers, and Streams.  They all have great covers.  I’m thrilled to be in their company.

Macmillan is the behemoth consolidated publisher that owns Farrar, Straus & Giroux. the publisher of What to Eat Now, which in turn owns Picador, the publisher of The Fish Counter.

The book is also listed at

• Barnes and Noble
• Drury Lane Books
• Amazon
• and can be pre-ordered from your local bookstore

I will have more to say about this book and What to Eat Now as the publication dates get closer.  Stay tuned!

As practically its last act under the Biden Administration, the FDA  Revoked Authorization for the Use of Red No. 3 in Food and Ingested Drugs.

The FDA is revoking the authorization for the use of FD&C Red No. 3 as a matter of law, based on the Delaney Clause of the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act (FD&C Act). The FDA is amending its color additive regulations to no longer allow for the use of FD&C Red No. 3 in food and ingested drugs in response to a 2022 color additive petition.

The Delaney Clause says the FDA cannot consider any substance that causes cancer in animals to be GRAS (generally recognized as safe).

Red 3 was associated with cancer in laboratory animals 30 years ago but the FDA considered the issue low priority and nobody complained until the Center for Science in the Public Interest filed its petition.  Then the FDA had to act.

For food safety advocates, this has been a long time coming.

The FDA’s action fits well with the Make America Health Again (MAHA) agenda.

Vani Hari (the Food Babe) says:

thefoodbabe (@Vani Hari) posted: It’s truly amazing what can happen when we put our differences aside & work together, it took a lot of loud American voices to get the FDA to ban red #3. Big thanks to @CSPI @ewg @SenRonJohnson @SenSanders @TTuberville @realannapaulina @CFSTrueFood @CoryBooker @RobertKennedyJr

She points out that this is only the first salvo in getting artificial food colors out of the food supply, especially breakfast cereals.

thefoodbabe (@Vani Hari) posted: .@KelloggsUS refusal to sit down with us will be biggest PR mistake in the Food Industry.

Food dyes may not be the most important food concern but they are unnecessary cosmetics and ought to be low hanging fruit for action.  Getting rid of them is long overdue.

Comment

RFK, Jr promised to get the artificial food dyes out of cereals as soon as he could be appointed HHS Secretary.  Will he do that immediately, or will this need to wait for the MAHA Commission action report in 6 months?  We shall see.

Press accounts

• The Washington Post – FDA bans controversial red dye found in candy, drinks and snacks
• cnnbrk (@CNN Breaking News) posted: FDA bans red dye No. 3 from food and ingested drugs in the US, more than 30 years after scientists discovered links to cancer in animals
• New York Times: F.D.A. Bans Red Dye 3 in Foods, Linking It to Cancer in Rats