Search results: a life in food

Marta Zaraska, the author of Meathooked: The History and Science of Our 2.5-Million-Year Obsession With Meat and, more recently, Growing Young: How Friendship, Optimism and Kindness Can Help You Live to 100, sent me this message:

While doing research on my 3rd book I stumbled upon a research paper in which the authors “forgot” to disclose connections to the meat industry. I thought this may be interesting to you. Here is a link to the paper – https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/10408398.2020.1741505

And here is a link proving that the lead author is taking money from the meat industry – which was not disclosed in the paper: https://www.usi.edu/liberal-arts/focus-newsletter/liberal-arts-achievements/la-achievements-2018-2019/

I thought this was well worth a look.  The full paper is here.

Title: “Meat and mental health: a systematic review of meat abstention and depression, anxiety, and related phenomena.”  Dobersek U, et al.  Critical Reviews in Food Science and Nutrition, 2020, published ahead of print.

Method: This is an meta-analysis of previously published papers (18) that compared the psychologica health of meat consumers and meat abstainers.

Conclusion: “The majority of studies, and especially the higher quality studies, showed that those who avoided meat consumption had significantly higher rates or risk of depression, anxiety, and/or self-harm behaviors…Our study does not support meat avoidance as a strategy to benefit psychological health.”

When I saw this conclusion, I immediately wondered: “Who paid for this?”  Bingo!

Funding: This study was funded in part via an unrestricted research grant from the Beef Checkoff, through the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association. The sponsor of the study had no role in the study design, data collection, data analysis, data interpretation, or writing of the report [for an interpretation of this last statement, see my book, Unsavory Truth: How Food Companies Skew the Science of What We Eat].

What got Marta Zaraska’s attention was the denial of conflicted interests related to this paper.

Disclosure: “No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).”

But the University of Southern Indiana praises the 2018-2019 accomplishments of the first author of this paper as follows (my emphasis):

Dr. Urska Dobersek, assistant professor of Psychology, and her students presented their research, “Are levels of testosterone, willingness to cheat and exercise motives related?” and “The relationship between facial asymmetry and exercise” at the North American Society for the Psychology of Sport and Physical Activity national conference in Baltimore, Maryland.

Dobersek also received a $10,555 grant from the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association to conduct a systematic review on “Beef for a Happier and Healthier Life.“

Oops.  Omission of this grant gives the appearance of conflicted interest and should have been disclosed.  I hope the author corrects this oversight immediately.

If the other authors have similar connections to meat industry group, they too should disclose them.

The Labor Department’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) has formed an alliance with the North American Meat Institute (NAMI) to

provide NAMI’s members, workplace safety and health professionals, the meatpacking and processing workforce, and the public with information, guidance, and access to training resources that will help them protect workers by reducing and preventing exposure to Coronavirus 2019 (COVID-19), and understand the rights of workers and the responsibilities of employers under the Occupational Safety and Health Act.

NAMI’s motto is “One unified voice for meat and poultry companies, large and small.”  Its members are listed here.

OSHA’s stated mission

With the Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1970, Congress created the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) to ensure safe and healthful working conditions for working men and women by setting and enforcing standards and by providing training, outreach, education and assistance.

• Do we see a potential conflict of interest here?  Indeed, we do.

Basically, the Alliance aims to

• Share information…regarding potential exposure to COVID-19 and the challenges for exposure control in meat packing and processing facilities.
• Develop information on the recognition of COVID-19 transmission risks and best practices.
• Conduct outreach through joint forums, roundtable discussions, stakeholder meetings, webinars, or other formats on OSHA guidance and NAMI’s good practices.
• Speak, exhibit, or appear at OSHA and NAMI conferences…regarding good practices.
• Encourage NAMI members…to utilize OSHA’s On-Site Consultation Program to improve health and safety and prevent COVID-19 transmission.

This looks like meat industry propaganda to me.

As quoted by Food Dive, Marc Perrone, president of the United Food and Commercial Workers International Union, called the deal “an outrage.” His statement:

Throughout the pandemic, employers have continued to keep workers and the general public in the dark about illness in the plants while trying to shield themselves from any liability for the role they played in the loss of life. It is shocking that the Department of Labor is now giving the meat industry even more power to police itself on worker safety.

He’s not kidding.  The Food and Environment Reporting Network is tracking cases.  As of August 17, its figures show confirmed cases of Covid-19 in

• 474 meatpacking plants among 40,708 meatpacking work (189 deaths)
• 269 food processing plants among 8658 food processing workers (34 deaths)

No surprisae, workers have filed thousands of complaints with OSHA.

What has OSHA done for them?  It co-issued (with CDC) guidance on what companies ought to be doing about distancing and masking. 

Are companies following this guidelines?  Not with much conviction.

That is why workers have had to resort to filing lawsuits against Smithfield Foods and Tyson Foods—and OSHA—as summarized by ProPublica.

According to Politico (behind a paywall, unfortunately), the lawsuits reveal that OSHA admits that it is unable to police its own safety guidelines.

Although an inspector from OSHA’s Wilkes-Barre Area Office witnessed employees working “2 to 3 feet” apart without physical barriers — which goes against the Centers for Disease Control and OSHA’s safety recommendations — the agency concluded there was no “imminent danger” at the plant, the inspector testified during a July 31 hearing.

As always, it’s hard to make up stuff like this.

Coca-Cola, which bought Odwalla juices in 2001, is discontinuing the brand and getting rid of 300 jobs and 230 trucks.

Why?  People aren’t buying it: too much sugar, and too much competition.

This is the end of a long saga.  Odwalla started out selling unpasteurized juices and was doing fine until it got too big.

Against company policy, it used apples that had fallen on the ground to make apple juice.  Some were contaminated with E. coli O157:H7, which carried a shiga toxin that caused illnesses and deaths.  In 1998:

Food safety lawyer Bill Marler, who represented some of the victims, some of whom have lifelong complications, says  Good riddance to bad rubbish.

During the course of the litigation, we uncovered that Odwalla had attempted to sell its juice in 1996 to the U.S. Army – no, not as a biological weapon – but to be sold in base grocery stores to our men and women service members and their families. The Army rejected the product – because it was not fit for military consumers.

His post includes the Army’s letter of rejection:  “We determined that your plant sanitation program does not adequatel assure product whoolesomeness for military consumers.”

It also includes some emails suggesting that Odwalla did not want to test for pathogens because they might find some:  “IF THE DATA is bad, what do we do about it.  Once you create a body of data, it is subpoenable.”

I wrote about the Odwalla events in my book, Safe Food.

The Odwalla outbreak provided convincing proof that unpasteurized and uncooked “natural” foods could contain the same pathogens as meat and poultry if they had the bad luck to come in contact with contaminated animal manure or meat.  For the industry, the lessons were mixed.  If food companies failed to reduce pathogens, their liability costs could be substantial–in money, time, legal penalties, and reputation—but these problems could be temporary and soon overcome (p. 99).

The end of a saga, indeed.

A reader in Australia writes that she “just came upon a doozy of an industry-funded paper.”

Title: Sales of Sugar-Sweetened Beverages in Australia: A Trend Analysis from 1997 to 2018, by William S. Shrapnel and Belinda E. Butcher.  Nutrients 2020, 12, 1016; doi:10.3390/nu12041016.

Conclusion: Major, long-term shifts are occurring in the market for non-alcoholic, water-based beverages in Australia, notably a fall in per capita volume sales of SSBs and an increase in volume sales of water. Both trends are consistent with public health nutrition strategies for obesity prevention and suggest that the downward trend in the percentage of dietary energy from added sugars in the Australian diet may be continuing.

Funding and Conflicts of Interest: This analysis was funded by an unrestricted grant from The Australian Beverages Council Ltd. 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.

So what’s the problem here (besides the usual questions about the accuracy of the “no role” statement)?

The clue comes from an article in Food Navigator Asia: “Not a taxing question: Australian sugar sweetened beverage consumption slumps as obesity rates continue to soar.”

The article quotes a representative of the Beverage Council:

Obesity is multi-factorial, the reason why people become overweight and then obese, is because of the lack of physical activity, a sedentary lifestyle, and also poor diet…a sugar tax alone would not reduce the obesity rates in the country, and was a complex challenge for the government to overcome.  The beverage industry is against a sugar tax, and SSB tax.  The evidence and science behind the effectiveness of a sugar tax is weak.

Comment: The point of this study is to produce evidence against the value of soda or sugar taxes, even though sodas are still the largest source of sugars in Australian diets, and taxes have been shown to reduce consumption in other countries.  When it comes to sugary drinks, less is better.

Just for fun, here’s Healthy Food America’s 2019 map of countries with soda taxes.

Thanks to  Jane Snell for alerting me to the UK’s Krispie Kreme efforts to deal with Covid-19.  It provides a Krispie Kreme Coronavirus Update website.

In addition to delivering surprise doughnut packages, we opened our first drive-thru in Manchester on 16^th April. The drive-thru is serving NHS, Police and Fire workers, who will be eligible to receive complimentary hot drinks and one of our three-packs of original glazed doughnuts. We hope to have all nine of our drive-thrus opened by the 27^th April, to serve NHS, Police and Fire workers, to support them in the battle against COVID-19.

The Update’s Community page, “Serving Smiles,” says:

We’ve all been asked to do our bit. To stay at home and patiently sit. To social distance. To wash our hands. To clap for carers. To call our grans. Big or small we all have our part to play. And ours? It’s delivering moments of joy each day. Now more than ever you all deserve a treat. And we want to remind you that life can be sweet. So we are back up and running throughout the British Isles. We are here to serve. Here to serve smiles.

It gets better: Krispie Kreme wants you to join its social movement.

The site comes with a Coronavirus Q and A.  I know you will be relieved to see this one:

The CEO says “I want to reassure you that the safety and wellbeing of our staff will always be our No 1 priority.”

Yeah, right.

I don’t see anything here about worker pay, alas.

Or about how eating fewer doughnuts might be a good idea right now.

Recall that Americans spend about half our food dollars on food consumed outside the home.   Therefore, the virus-induced closure of restaurants affects food supply chains, but it also affects restaurant workers, owners, operators, and patrons.

Restaurant workers

A survey by the New York State Restaurant Association says 80 percent of state restaurant workers have been laid off since the outbreak started—more than 527,000 people.

In a letter to Congress, the National Restaurant Association says 8 million restaurant employees have already been furloughed or laid off, or two-thirds of the entire workforce.

The New York Times reports that restaurants account for about 40 percent of COVID-19 related layoffs, the most of any industry.  This statistic is based on New York State Department of Labor data.

Restaurant owners

To get an idea of what this is like for small restaurant owners, read Gabrielle Hamilton’s account in the New York Times Sunday Magazine: My Restaurant Was My Life for 20 Years. Does the World Need It Anymore?  Hamilton is the award-winning chef-owner of Prune, a small restaurant in Manhattan’s East Village.

The Wall Street Journal reports that restaurant chains cannot adequately source masks and gloves for their employees.

Restaurant patrons

Tom Sietsema, the restaurant critic for the Washington Post, writes about what it feels like to not be able to go to restaurants.

Gee, do I miss the good old days. And boy, am I trying hard to summon them from home. Honestly, though, my new acquaintances Caviar, Postmates and Uber Eats can never replace all the in-the-flesh servers and chefs who have made Washington a premier restaurant destination in recent years.

The bailouts

Restaurants are having special problems with the government’s forgivable loan program.  It turns out, the expansion of unemployment benefits authorized by the $2 trillion stimulus package sometimes pay workers twice their restaurant salary.

What?  Unemployment benefits pay MORE than restaurant work?  The shocking figures: unemployment benefits go to an average high of $970 per week, but this is nearly double average weekly pay within the food industry.

The $350 billion loan program quickly ran out of money when more than 46,000 loans were approved.   Food services firms got $30.5 billion.

Most of the money went to large restaurant firms: ‘The Big Guys Get Bailed Out’: Restaurants Vie for Relief Funds”

The provision, in a section outlining which small businesses qualify for loans from the federal government, allowed big chains like Shake Shack, Potbelly and Ruth’s Chris Steak House to get tens of millions of dollars while many smaller restaurants walked away with nothing when the $349 billion fund was exhausted last week. On Monday, Congress and the White House were nearing a deal to replenish that fund with $300 billion in additional relief.  The inequity caused widespread outrage. Independent owners said it would create a post-pandemic landscape in which chains dominated and small, vibrant restaurants collapsed. Some lawmakers said the outcome had violated the spirit of the legislation.

Chains like Potbelly, Ruth’s Chris Steak House and Taco Cabana qualified to get the maximum $10 million in loans even though they employed thousands of workers.

Some of these companies had been making money but spent it to buy back their own stocks.  As the New York Times reported “Some Companies Seeking Bailouts Had Piles of Cash, Then Spent It.” Those companies, includingd KFC, Wendy’s, and Papa John’s, among others, asked for $145 billion in relief.

These companies had been highly profitable in recent years, yet they were seeking help from the federal government. Where had all their money gone? Like much of corporate America, the restaurant chains had spent a large chunk on buying back their own stock, a practice aimed at bolstering its price. Some were even more vulnerable to the economic shock because they had previously increased their borrowing — including to fund buybacks or pay dividends — and strained their credit in the process.

Some companies, embarrassed by the uproar, returned the funds.  The first to do so was Shake Shack (see Danny Meyer’s statement) 

Now the restaurant industry wants its own targeted recovery fund, as it explained in a letter to Congress.

What will restaurants look like in the future?

For sure, they will be different.

The National Restaurant Association, which represents chain restaurants, issued new general guidelines.   These largely defer to government regulations, but leave most practices to owners’ discretion.

Independent restaurant groups are trying to develop more detailed protocols.  They refer to a set of guidelines  issued by the founder of Black Sheep Restaurants in Hong Kong.

I hope that the revelations about how badly restaurant workers are treated and paid will inspire legislative action.

To me, the most shocking revelation is how restaurant workers who rely on tips do not qualify for unemployment insurance in some states because their salaries are so low that they do not meet earning requirements.  That has to change.

DairyReporter.com has a Special Edition on infant feeding 

Infant formula companies have a problem: the products are virtually identical in nutrient composition (they all have to meet the same FDA standards), babies only need them for the first year, and the number of babies is finite.  From the formula industry’s perspective, the challenge is how to increase sales.  Here’s how this industry is managing this challenge.

Where next for infant nutrition?

In this special edition, we take a look at the infant formula sector, which far from being static is changing through novel ingredients, smart packaging, the explosion in plant-based products, and production of breast milk from cells.

• Making baby formula transparent with Danone’s Track & Connect:  Packaging with QR codes and a new digital platform make up Danone’s Track & Connect service for baby formula products. It is available in China, with launches in France, Germany, Australia and New Zealand soon… Read
• How to trigger a growth spurt in infant nutrition:  Consumers could be forgiven for believing that innovation in infant nutrition is less radical or slower than it is in other parts of the nutrition industry… Read
• Alternatives to traditional infant nutrition hit US market:  Market trends and unique consumer needs in infant nutrition have producers thinking outside the realms of tradition. New launches from Else Nutrition and Biomilq have recently hit the US, forming new categories… Read
• TurtleTree Labs secures funding for production of milk from cells:  TurtleTree Labs, the Singapore-based company working with biotechnology to create the full nutritional content of milk, has announced it has completed its pre-seed funding round… Read
• Stricter EU infant formula marketing rules to come into effect:  New EU food law designed to further restrict the advertising and marketing of infant formula are to come into force on 22 February in a victory for campaigners critical of current guidelines… Read
• Combating cow’s milk protein allergy: Nestlé Health Science China introduces two new FSMPs brands:  Two of Nestlé Health Science China’s infant nutrition products for youngsters with cow’s milk allergies have obtained Food for Special Medical Purposes (FSMPs) status in the country… Read
• Catering for different life stages: What’s next for China’s A2 milk industry in 2020?  China’s A2 milk sector is likely to see the rise of more products catered to different life stages and specific consumers groups, beyond just infant nutrition, as more domestic companies join in the competition… Read

I’ve been collecting items on what’s happening in the plant-based food world.  Lots.  It’s the hot new topic, as demonstrated by a recent Rabobank Talking Points survey.

For starters, do not miss the competing 30-second, spelling bee videos.  The first is from the Center for Consumer Freedom,  the discredited PR firm that never reveals who pays for their campaigns, although this one is pretty easy to guess; it aired in Washington, DC during the SuperBowl.  The 30-second rebuttal parody is from Impossible Foods, the inventor and marketer of Impossible Burgers.  CNBC has an exceptionally clear account of what this is all about.

Next, check out the February edition of Scientific American, which has a page titled “Meat the Imitators.” This lists the ingredients of four imitation meats, including Impossible Burger, in comparison to a burger made with real beef.  Worth a look.

Then, see The Guardian on how all this happened (with a long section on cell-based meat, as well).

And now to the industry perspective:

• • • Violife makes US (re)debut into plant-based cheese category:  Popular among vegan circles, plant-based cheese brand Violife is breaking into mainstream US grocery channels where it can go head to head with the likes of Daiya Foods and Kite Hill…. Read more
    • Nestlé and Merit Functional Foods enter joint development agreement to scale pea and canola proteins supply:  Under a new joint development agreement, Nestlé will help Merit Functional Foods and its technology partner, Burcon NutraScience, scale and commercialize its portfolio of plant proteins with the goal of using the startup’s novel ingredients in foods and beverages produced by the world’s largest food company…. Read more
    • Folded, frozen, and faster: JUST Egg is now more convenient, and cheaper, to enjoy:  Eat JUST, Inc, known for its JUST Egg liquid plant-based egg replacement made from the mung bean, has debuted a folded product that requires novice culinary skills to make, said co-founder and CEO Josh Tetrick, whose preferred method of preparation is the standard toaster…. Read more
    • Harmless Harvest moves into plant-based yogurt: ‘We’re making it pretty differently than just about anyone else’  Harmless Harvest – which has carved a distinct niche in the coconut water category via its use of micro-filtration (instead of thermal pasteurization) – is promising to bring the same commitment to novel processing methods, organic ingredients, and clean labels, to the plant-based yogurt market…. Read more
    • Roquette ‘significantly increases’ pea protein supply deal with Beyond Meat:  Ingredients specialist Roquette has extended its pea protein supply agreement with Beyond Meat for three more years. The amount supplied will ‘significantly’ increase compared to 2019 figures, Roquette executive Jean-Philippe Azoulay tells FoodNavigator…. Read more
    • Plant-based seafood brand Good Catch raises over $32m in Series B financing round: Gathered Foods, parent company to plant-based seafood brand Good Catch, has closed a series B funding round led by several industry players including Greenleaf Foods and 301 INC, the venture arm of General Mills…. Read more
    • Cool Beans targets shoppers seeking plant-based whole foods, not ‘processed’ meat analogs: The quest to precisely mimic the taste and texture of meat and dairy is driving innovation in the next generation of ‘plant-based’ foods. But there is also growing demand for less ‘processed’ products made from whole foods, says the CEO of Cool Beans…. Read more
    • Where next for plant-based in 2020? ADM shares top trend predictions for the category: The total retail market for plant-based foods in the US was worth nearly $4.5bn* in 2019 with dollar sales growing at 31% over the past two years compared to 4% for US retail total dollar food sales. And according to global ingredients supplier ADM, 2020 is “going to be another breakout year for the category.”… Read more  
    • Bubble burst? Researchers question long-term health and environmental effects of plant-based diet: Plant-based products have recently come under fire for potential negative health and environmental effects, but much of this has so far gone more or less unnoticed and/or unmentioned by its proponents, it has been claimed…. Read more 
    • Displaying entire nutrition profile of animal protein could protect sales from plant-based competition:  So far, the health halo surrounding plant-based products has led many consumers to overlook characteristics of newer versions of meatless products that might be a turnoff in other food categories, including longer-ingredient lists and less favorable nutritional profiles, suggests new research from the International Food Information Council Foundation… Read