As a distraction from Brexit, perhaps, the British government has just launched a new anti-acrylamide campaign aimed at home cooks: “Go for Gold.”

By Gold, it is referring to the preferred color of toast: the lighter the color, the less acrylamide, a carcinogen formed when foods containing sugars and the amino acid asparagine are cooked at high temperatures.  This is a Maillard reaction, which causes baked, fried, and toasted foods to turn attractively brown and delicious.

As the BBC explains,

The response?  Critics immediately complained that evidence linking acrylamide to cancer is weak and that this campaign is unnecessarily scary and distracting from real public health problems such as food insecurity and obesity.

I’ve written about Acrylamide several times in the past.  Here’s what I said in 2009: “Acrylamide, sigh”:

I don’t know what to say about acrylamide.  Acrylamide is the powerful carcinogen that gets formed when carbohydrates and proteins are cooked together at high temperature, as in dark toast, French fries, and potato chips. I just can’t figure out how bad it is, and I like my toast well toasted.  But: Canada recently added acrylamide to its list of toxic substances.  The European Union has just listed it as a hazardous chemical “of high concern.”

It’s better to avoid it, I guess.  But is this a number one priority for a national public health campaign?

The two agencies have just issued advice to pregnant women about eating fish.

Fatty fish have long-chain omega-3 fatty acids which are good for health.

But some have methylmercury, which is toxic to the developing fetus.

And all have PCBs or other organic compounds that are unlikely to promote health.

The advice?  Eat 2 to 3 servings of lower-mercury fish per week for a total of 8-12 ounces

That’s fine, but which fish are low in methylmercury?

For this, the agencies have created an reference chart that sorts 62 types of fish into three categories:

“Best Choices” (eat two to three servings a week)

“Good Choices” (eat one serving a week)

“Fish to Avoid”

Here’s where things get tricky.

• Choices to avoid include, among others, Bigeye Tuna and Tilefish from the Gulf of Mexico.
• Good choices include Albacore and Yellowfin Tuna and Tilefish from the Atlantic Ocean.

Good luck telling the difference.

As I’ve written before (and also see this post and this one about fish politics), if you want to avoid methylmercury during pregnancy, it’s best to avoid tuna.  Consumer Reports advises pregnant women not to eat tuna at all.

Center for Science in the Public Interest says:

The best advice for pregnant or nursing women and parents of small children is to choose fish that are low in mercury and high in omega-3 fatty acids, like salmon and sardines. They should avoid albacore tuna altogether, and consume tuna labeled as ‘light tuna’ very sparingly — no more than two ounces per week for women and one ounce per week for kids.

And are PCBs a non-issue?  Could fish politics have anything to do with this?

Here are the documents

• Eating Fish: What Pregnant Women and Parents Should Know
• Federal Register Notice Announcing the Advice
• FDA and EPA final advice (this updates advice proposed in June 2014)

Last week I posted this about Canada’s new food label:

• A Canadian study shows that two-thirds of packaged foods sold in Canada have added sugar.
• Canada’s new food label is causing a fuss over the sugar listing because it (a) does not distinguish between intrinsic and added sugars, and (b) sets 100 grams per day as the standard amount.  Looks like the Canadian sugar lobby won this one.

I received a note from a reader who sent an article from the Canada Gazette giving some of the background for these decisions.

The government did a cost-benefit analysis of the then-proposed label:

Costs were estimated based on the inclusion of all regulatory options that were presented during consultations (i.e. the U.S. approach for added sugar, mandatory inclusion of vitamin D in the NFt). Stakeholders indicated that the cost would be a maximum of $727.1 million and with the removal of outliers, $598 million. However, the decision to use a Daily Value approach for sugars instead of added sugars would significantly lower these costs…The coming-into-force period of 5 years was chosen to minimize the cost of implementing the proposed amendments.

How did the Daily Value get to be 100 grams per day, twice the U.S. Daily Value of 50 grams?  All it says is:

A DV of 100 g is being proposed for sugar, and the declaration of the % DV for sugar in the NFt would be mandated for all foods.

Food industry politics in action!

George Kent.  Caring about Hunger.  Irene Publishing, 2016

Kent is a former professor of political science at the University of Hawai’i who in his retirement is teaching at the University of Sydney in Australia and Saybrook University in California.  His book is about the causes of hunger and how to overcome them.   He’s been at this for a long time and can boil the causes down to brief summaries.

• Disjunction: Hunger and poverty persist largely because the people who have the power to solve the problems are not the ones who have the problems.
• Compassion: On the whole, the people who have the power do not have much compassion for the powerless.
• Material interests: The powerful serve mainly the powerful, not the powerless, because the powerless cannot do much for the benefit of the powerful.

Much of the book focuses on compassion and what he calls “caring.”

• Hunger is less likely to occur where people care about one another’s well being.
• Caring behavior is strengthened when people work and play together.
• Hunger in any community is likely to be reduced by encouraging people to work and play together, especially in food-related activities.

He gives plenty of examples of how to make all this work.

Utopian?  Yes, but we need to start somewhere.

I am late in getting to this report on school meals from the Pew Charitable Trusts and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundations, which came out in early December. 

Their jointly sponsored Kids Safe and Healthful Foods Project took a good hard look at how schools were faring under the Obama administration’s rules for healthier lunches, breakfasts, and snacks. 

Some of their findings:

• 6 in 10 directors said they faced only a few or no ongoing obstacles to meeting updated breakfast requirements; 4 in 10 said the same of the lunch guidelines.
• For breakfast and lunch, the commonly cited challenges were sodium and whole grain targets.
• Most programs use a mix of strategies—three, on average—to encourage students to eat nutritious meals (e.g., salad bars).
• Holding taste tests with students and redistributing uneaten, sealed foods were among the most effective ways to reduce waste (but only about 40% of schools were doing this). 
• Programs preparing more foods from scratch and increased the use of salad bars were more likely to report that student participation rose or was unchanged from 2011-2015.
• Two-thirds of schools reported compliance with the Smart Snacks nutrition standards.
• Equipment and labor costs were the most frequently reported financial concerns.
• 84 percent of program directors reported rising or stable combined revenue (meal reimbursements plus snack and beverage sales) in the past year. 

Most schools are managing; some are still having problems.  My guess is that what I’ve always observed is still true: if the school food director and the principal are committed to serving healthier meals, they find a way to do that.  If not, they don’t.  Schools that cook from scratch do better—but that also takes commitment.

Most needed are (1) enough money to do it right, and (2) education, training, and decent pay for school food service personnel.

Documents and links:

• The press release
• About the report
• The full report
•  Audio recording of media briefing
• Recent research on nutritional benefits of school meals
• The Pew and RWJ website on the Kids’ Safe and Healthful Foods Project

Last week was a big one for comments about sugars.  I’m traveling this week but here’s a quick round-up.

• Julia Belluz of Vox explains what sugar is about (I’m quoted) and displays a great graphic of where it hides in food (here’s an excerpt).
  
• Gary Taubes, author of The Case Against Sugar, summarizes how the sugar industry attempted to manipulate research on the effects of fat v. sugar and heart disease risk.
• Yoni Freedhoff counters with a somewhat different perspective on Taubes’ interpretations and the sugar story.
• A Canadian study shows that two-thirds of packaged foods sold in Canada have added sugar.
• Canada’s new food label is causing a fuss over the sugar listing because it (a) does not distinguish between intrinsic and added sugars, and (b) sets 100 grams per day as the standard amount.  Looks like the Canadian sugar lobby won this one.

Thanks to nutritionist (and graduate of our NYU program) Andy Bellatti for sending a photo of this product.

What got his attention was “sweetened only with fruit juice.”  But it’s a juice drink, not

Who knew that NASA was interested in food security and agriculture?  I certainly didn’t.  But I was recently sent this request for proposals.  No, they are not looking to grow food on spaceships or Mars.

But they are looking to use space technology to

ROSES-16 Amendment 53: Release of New Program Element A.51 Food Security and Agriculture.

NASA solicits proposals to enable and advance uses of Earth observations by domestic and international organizations to benefit food security and agriculture. Global food security represents a major societal challenge for the coming decades, and NASA recognizes that space-based Earth observations can provide key information to support the functioning and resilience of food systems.

NASA encourages that proposals involve a multisectoral, transdisciplinary team of organizations as a consortium to manage a program of activities to achieve the objectives. The scope includes applications development, user characterization and engagement, innovative communications work, and impact assessments as part of the activities.

The solicitation includes two elements: International Food Security and Domestic Agriculture.  Key objectives include:

• Advance use of Earth observations for enhanced food security and improved agricultural practices, especially for humanitarian pursuits, economic progress, resilience, and sustainability;
• Increase the adoption of Earth observations applications and broaden the suite of organizations routinely using them to inform decisions and actions;
• Expand the number of applications developed, tested, and (if successful) adopted across sectors, decision types, and other meaningful factors;
• Advance understanding of effective ways – both technically and programmatically – to enable sustained applications of Earth observations;
• Enhance awareness within food security and agricultural communities of upcoming Earth observing satellite missions and encourage the community development of new applications;
• Advance impact assessment techniques quantifying the benefits of Earth observations, increasing the number of examples and case studies across sectors and decision types;
• Identify opportunities and topics for possible future investigations;
• Advance communication of the benefits of Earth science and observations.

Notices of Intent to propose are requested by February 17, 2017, and proposals are due April 7, 2017.

Information about a preproposal conference from 2:30-4:00 pm eastern time on February 24, 2017, and later a Frequently Asked Questions document, will be posted on the NSPIRES web page for A.51 Earth Science Applications: Food Security and Agriculture. 

Questions concerning this program element may be directed to Brad Doorn at Bradley.Doorn@nasa.gov with “ROSES FS & Ag Inquiry” in the subject line or by contacting him via information listed in the summary table of key information.

Wouldn’t this be fun and fascinating to work on?  I’d love to!