Search results: food policy action

New York City is taking big steps to improve its food system.   Two reports are worth noting, one from the Mayor’s office and one from the Health Department.

I.  Mayor Bill de Blasio and Kate MacKenzie, Director of the Mayor’s Office of Food Policy (MOFP) have released Food Forward NYC: A 10-Year Food Policy Plan.

Here’s how they introduce this impressive report:

Food Forward NYC is the City’s first ever 10-year food policy plan, laying out an comprehensive policy framework to reach a more equitable, sustainable, and healthy food system by 2031.

Food Forward NYC emphasizes the importance of equity and choice – enabling a food system where everyone should be able to access the food they want wherever they may want it. To enable this choice, we need to support both our food workers and our food businesses. To strengthen the sustainability and resiliency of our food system, we need to rethink our food infrastructure and deepen our connections with the region.

Food Forward NYC is organized around five overarching goals:

1. All New Yorkers have multiple ways to access healthy, affordable, and culturally appropriate food.
2. New York City’s food economy drives economic opportunity and provides good jobs.
3. The supply chains that feed New York City are modern, efficient, and resilient.
4. New York City’s food is produced, distributed, and disposed of sustainably.
5. Support the systems and knowledge to implement the 10-year food policy plan.

The full report is here.  It was prepared in response to Local Law 40 of 2020 and recommendations from the New York City Council’s 2019 report, Growing Food Equity in New York City.  

New York City is a complicated place and it’s wonderful to have all this information put together in such a coherent way.  Let’s hope everyone gets behind this and puts the recommendations into action.

II.  The Bureau of Chronic Disease Prevention at the NYC Health Department has an update on its  National Salt and Sugar Reduction Initiative (NSSRI).

In October 2018, the Bureau announced draft sugar reduction targets.  Now they have updated them and added targets for salt reduction, as well.  As I was informed in an e-mail,

The NSSRI is a partnership of over 100 local city and state health departments, associations, and health organizations, convened by the NYC Department of Health. We have set voluntary sugar reduction targets for 15 categories of food and beverages. The targets represent a 10% reduction in sugar content of products by 2023, and a 20% reduction by 2026 for food with a 40% reduction for beverages.

The current public health landscape demonstrates that diet remains critical, even during a public health emergency like COVID-19. Diet-related health conditions such as diabetes and heart disease, which can increase the risk of severe illness from COVID-19, are important to address right now.

Here’s what one of the sugar reduction targets looks like:

The objective of NSSRI is this:

To promote gradual, achievable and meaningful reductions in sugar content in packaged foods and beverages. This is because intake of added sugars is associated with increased risk of excess weight, type 2 diabetes, hypertension, stroke, heart disease and cavities.

The targets are indeed gradual; the hope it that they will be met by 2026.

The targets are, of course, voluntary.  The best NSSRI can do is to encourage companies to comply and hold them accountable.

It’s a start.

The report, associated documents, and announcement video are on this Lancet website 

I’ll start with a déjà vu, thanks to Daniel Bowman Simon, who reminds me that President John F. Kennedy’s first executive orderwas to expand food distribution programs that both helped farmers and fed the poor.

President Biden is taking steps in the same direction.  On January 22, the USDA announced:

• P-EBT Benefit Increase: “the Pandemic Electronic Benefits Transfer (P-EBT) connects low-income families with kids with food dollars equivalent to the value of the meals missed due to COVID-related school and childcare closures….USDA will increase the current daily benefit amount by approximately 15% to tackle the serious problem of child food insecurity during this school year when need is greatest.”  This is great but the big problem with this program has been delays.  Let’s hope those get fixed too.
• SNAP Emergency Allotments to States: USDA wants to “allow states to provide extra SNAP benefits through Emergency Allotments to the lowest-income households.”  This is because the increases to SNAP authorized by Congress were set up in such a way that they did not go to the lowest-income households (37% of SNAP households) most in need.
• Revising the Thrifty Food Plan Per 2018 Farm Bill:  This plan, the basis for determining SNAP benefits, is decades old, out of date, and unrealistic for SNAP households.  USDA needs to revise it.

In addition, Biden is calling for More Congressional Action:  

• Extend the 15% SNAP benefit increase
• Invest another $3 billion through the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC).
• Look for creative ways to support restaurants as a critical link in the food supply chain to help feed families in need
• Provide U.S. Territories with $1 billion in additional nutrition assistance funding

OK.  This does not go far enough and who knows what this Congress will do.  But it’s a start, and a good one.

But that’s not all: Biden has appointed Stacy Dean as deputy undersecretary for Food, Nutrition, and Consumer Services, the piece of USDA responsible for food assistance.  This puts her in charge of all this.

I consider this a superb appointment.  Nobody knows more about food assistance programs.  I learned this when I was editing a set of papers about SNAP for the American Journal of Public Health in 2019.  She and colleagues at the Center for Budget and Policy Priorities wrote the basic article for the series.

So: our job now is to loudly and strongly support everything USDA is doing to improve and expand food assistance, and to encourage the agency to take even bigger steps.  Make sure Stacy gets all the support she needs to really do sometime to improve food security for the millions of American adults and children who need it badly. 

A report to the Family Farm Action Alliance, “THE FOOD SYSTEM: CONCENTRATION AND ITS IMPACT,” shows just how monopolistic this industry has become.

The CR4 metric is the percentage of the particular industry owned by the top 4 companies.  The top 4 beef processing companies control 73% of all beef processing.  The top 4 soft drink companies control 82%.  The top 3 cereal companies control 80%.  Anything over about 50% is considered to be highly concentrated.

What’s wrong with a high CR4 index?

Agrifood consolidation reduces farmer autonomy and redistributes costs and benefits across the food chain, squeezing farmer incomes. In 2018, farmers whose primary occupation was farming but with sales of less than $350,000 had a median net income of -$1,524. An agriculture system without people has depopulated rural communities causing a collapse in social relationships. Communities of color bear a disproportionate burden of exposure to excessive pesticide use or large animal confinement operations.

What is to be done?

At the heart of this analysis is a focus on power – both economic and political. Ultimately American political democracy rests on economic democracy and vice versa (Wu 2018). Thus, our laser focus in scholarship, praxis and policy must be on democratizing the agrifood system through a multitude of strategies at local, state, regional and national scales.

Here’s a new must-read report:

This is a thorough and carefully done analysis of the ways in which Big Food companies took advantage of the Covid-19 pandemic as a marketing opportunity.  The report gives more than 40 specific examples of corporate:

● Nutri-washing: Coupling “solidarity actions” with aggressive marketing of junk food and sugary drink brands, which helped polish corporate images
● Positioning ultra-processed food and drinks as “essential products” when they are not healthy foods
● Playing both sides: Carrying out philanthropic actions while actively lobbying against healthy food policies
● Using charity to push junk food: Donating ultra-processed food and drinks to vulnerable populations

Here’s just one example:

The report is short and beautifully designed.  It comes from the Global Health Advocacy Incubator.  This group produces tools for advocacy, among other useful items.

As Bettina Siegel wrote earlier this year.

America’s poor diet is the leading cause of poor health and is responsible for more than half a million deaths per year. And if our current comfort food bender demonstrates anything, it’s that when people’s sense of security is fundamentally threatened, they’re very often compelled to seek relief and pleasure in unhealthy food.

The report shows how food companies take advantage of our current vulnerabilities.  That’s another reason why the UK’s stop-marketing proposal (I wrote about it yesterday) is so badly needed.

With millions of people out of work, food insecurity is becoming a bigger problem than it has been. Some recent items:

From Politico: “Stark racial disparities emerge as families struggle to get enough food”

The last time the government formally measured food insecurity nationally was in 2018. At that time, about 25 percent of Black households with children were food insecure. Today, the rate is about 39 percent, according to the latest analysis by the Northwestern economists, which is set to be published this week. For Hispanic households with kids, the rate was nearly 17 percent in 2018. Today, it is nearly 37 percent.

From Northwestern, a new report: “Food Insecurity During COVID-19 in Households with Children: Results by Racial and Ethnic Groups”

Disparities in food insecurity across racial and ethnic groups are large. Across the eight weeks for which CHHPS microdata are available covering April 23–June 23, 41.1% of Black respondents’ households have experienced food insecurity in the prior week, as have 36.9% of Hispanic respondents’ households and 23.2% of White respondents’ households.

From the Brookings Institution’s Hamilton Project: “About 14 million children in America are not getting enough to eat”

Accounting for the number of children in these households, I find that 13.9 million children lived in a household characterized by child food insecurity in the third week in June, 5.6 times as many as in all of 2018 (2.5 million) and 2.7 times as many than did at the peak of the Great Recession in 2008 (5.1 million). During the week of June 19-23, 17.9 percent of children in the United States live in a household where an adult reported that the children are not getting enough to eat due to a lack of resources.

From the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities: “Boosting SNAP: 5 Reasons Why Households Need More”

The Families First Coronavirus Response Act of March included much-needed measures to temporarily increase SNAP benefits for many households and let state SNAP agencies temporarily modify procedures…But these temporary benefits didn’t help everyone who needs them, and they aren’t enough to help families afford food, given the challenges that COVID-19 and the downturn have presented. Here are five reasons why the next relief package needs to include an additional boost in SNAP benefits:

From The Counter: “Covid-19 has increased online SNAP purchases twentyfold—and Amazon, Walmart have a lock on virtually all those sales”

The USDA has been pushing online food sales for SNAP recipients, and COVID-19 is accelerating the trend.  The Counter article explains that

more than 750,000 households had used food stamps benefits online as of late June. That’s up from just 35,000 in March….As of early July, 43 states are approved to accept SNAP benefits online, and 39 have the program up and running.

The Counter also notes:

One thing is certain: At this point, two big retailers stand to benefit from the explosion in online SNAP sales. In 34 of the 39 states, Amazon and Walmart are the only participating grocers. The reasons why are likely logistical.. Few independent grocers have the web infrastructure to display and update their inventory online, making Amazon and Walmart a kind of duopoly by default. Even fewer have enough staff to assemble complex orders and deliver them to people’s homes. By contrast, Amazon and Walmart have been investing heavily in grocery delivery for years.

Comment

No matter how useful they are, online deliveries cost more and SNAP does not pay delivery costs.  Online also requires a computer and broadband access.  Do SNAP participants have these things?

The 750,000 housaeholds using the online system constitute a small fraction of the 19 million households enrolled in SNAP.

We have a long way to go to solve problems of food insecurity in this country.

RIP

• Floyd Cardoz, a chef whose food I loved, is one of the early casualties.  I last talked to him at an event not six weeks ago.  He was having a hard time.  But to end like this?  A heartbreak.

Predictions of high risk

• Obesity and type 2 diabetes make people more vulnerable:  Reuters reports on the situation in Mexico.

Effects on food systems

• Countries are starting to hoard food:  Bloomberg News reports.  [Oh great.  Just what we need].
• Industry trade groups work together to fill gaps, create economic stability as COVID-19 spreads:  An ad-hoc partnership between FMI-Food Industry Association, the International Foodservice Distributors Association, United Produce Association and National Fisheries Institute aims to help overwhelmed grocery retailers keep shelves stocked, stores clean and employees safe in the coming weeks while also providing economic stability as foodservice distributors see business dry up unexpectedly due to the coronavirus pandemic…. Read more
• With Covid-19, wild-animal markets face new pressures to shutter: The trade in wild animals is coming under increasing pressure to shut down, ever since the source of the Covid-19 pandemic was linked to a “wet market” in Wuhan, China, where throngs of customers shop for live animals held in cramped quarters, as Brian Barth reports in FERN’s latest story.
• United Fresh calls for federal assistance for COVID-19 losses:  The United Fresh Produce Association is requesting urgent action by Congress to help the fresh produce supply chain deal with the financial shocks caused by the coronavirus COVID-19 outbre

The alcohol industry responds

• US alcohol calls on Congress for economic relief from COVID-19: With the economic fallout from the COVID-19 crisis only likely to worsen, the federal government is announcing different forms of aid packages. US alcohol associations are now asking for assistance…. Read more
• Coronavirus: Alcohol struggles as bars close, but ecommerce thrives: The beverage industry is keeping a close eye on the rippling effects from the COVID-19 pandemic. And in the US, there have been a few positives mixed in with the negatives, such as a boom for ecommerce…. Read more
• Alcohol companies pivot to producing hand sanitizer as coronavirus intensifies: As consumers empty store shelves of the popular gel, local distilleries and bigger companies like Diageo and Anheuser-Busch are helping to alleviate the shortage while finding a new source of revenue.

Here come the panaceas

• Uncle Joe’s Mint Balls ramps up production of its Throat And Chest and Herbal Cough lozenges during Coronavirus: Uncle Joe’s Mint Balls has shifted production to its Throat And Chest and Herbal Cough lozenges to help people suffering from the effects of coronavirus…. Read more
• Coronavirus prompts spike in e-commerce sales of CBD; consumers seek higher dose products: Regulatory uncertainty coupled with the fact that retailers are not focused on onboarding new brands right now make this a tough time for new CBD brands. However, e-commerce sales of hemp-derived CBD have spiked, while a new survey from Brightfield Group suggests that four in 10 CBD consumers plan to use CBD more frequently because of COVID-19, with 15% planning to use a higher dose…. Read more
• Coronavirus is driving sales of probiotic products: Why?  These are marketed as immunity boosters [if only].
• Charles Piller writes in Science about the risks of malaria drugs

Here come the frauds

• The Department of Justice has issued a fraud warning:  It lists the schemes and legal liabilities.
• FairWarning says “Here come the frauds…Coronavirus cons begin“
• Coronavirus immunity claim warning for Omega-3 industry: Omega-3 businesses have been warned about the dangers of making immunity claims during this Coronavirus crisis…. Read more

For useful information

• The CUNY Urban Food Policy Center is studying the effects of Covid-19 on New York City’s food system.  Its website is here.
• The New York State Health Foundation has COVID-19 resources for nonprofits and community-based organizations, about food assistance as well as other matters.

From the New York Times

Does food transmit Coronavirus?  

• Basically no (with some cautions).  See yesterday’s post for details.

Keeping up Coronoavirus  

• Healthroid has a summary.  The maps are updated daily
• Food Policy Watch: This weekly newsletter does a terrific job of keeping up with news reports, especially those explaining how to cope with what’s happening.

How to survive working at home (watch out for junk food) 

• Washington Post cartoonist Ann Telnaes has some suggestions

How to take action

• Beautiful Trouble has a guide to action against COVID-19: support your neighbors, change the system

Advice for the food industry

• US lays out new COVID-19 guidelines for food industry  The Trump Administration released a set of coronavirus guidelines for all Americans, with special provisions for critical infrastructure industries like food and beverage. Brands have been adapting this week to the new reality, while keeping employee safety a top priority…. Read more

What’s happening with supermarkets and supply chains?

• Empty shelves will soon be ‘a thing of the past,’ says grocery supply expert: As the novel coronavirus spreads, many people have stocked up on pantry items and paper products in anticipation of hunkering down at home for an extended period, creating temporary shortages of certain products. To better understand the grocery supply chain and how stores are stocked, FERN turned to Dr. Ananth Iyer, a professor of supply chain management at Purdue University and director of the university’s Global Supply Chain Management Initiative.
• Food chain tackles panic buying surge: Coronavirus concerns, sparking panic buying have forced manufacturers, distributors and retailers into special measures to manage the spending surge… Read
• Food delivery curfews relaxed to supermarkets: The Government is to relax food delivery hours to supermarkets and other retailers to help the supply chain cope with demand due to the Coronavirus COVID-19… Read
•  Grocers ‘have a viable supply chain’ & ‘are not shutting down,’ but product mix may change, FMI says:  The bare grocery shelves that many consumers have encountered over the last few days due to Covid-19-related stockpiling are not a harbinger of long-term shortages or a precursor to store closures, but they could signal a shift in the types of products retailers stock and manufacturers produce, according to FMI, the food industry association…. Read more 
• A Brooklyn co-op hustles as food demand spikes: Like other grocery stores in New York City, the Park Slope Food Co-op, in Brooklyn, is out of hand sanitizer. But even with 17,000 members and weekly sales of $1.23 million, shelves at one of the nation’s oldest and largest food co-ops are nearly full. “We got the hang of it very quickly after the initial enormous jolt of extra purchases hit 15 days ago,” Joe Holtz, the co-op’s general manager and co-founder, said late last week.
• Retailers, officials insist the food supply is strong as grocery stores are emptied:  A recent surge of demand has emptied some grocery store shelves of staples, as shoppers concerned about the spread of the novel coronavirus prepare to self-isolate at home. But the U.S. has plenty of food and Americans should not panic, urged food retailers, producers, and the federal government over the weekend.
• Cocoa disruption expected on markets as coronavirus continues to spread:  ‘During risk-off periods in markets, the prices of all products tend to move lower. When price carnage hits markets, rationality takes a holiday,’ said analyst Andrew Hecht…. Read more
• What will happen to the produce industry after coronavirus shut down visa processing?  The policy shift to limit the virus’ spread is likely to hamper this season’s planting and harvesting since fruit and vegetable growers heavily rely on foreign workers.

What to avoid: dubious schemes for immune boosting

• Coronavirus sparks ‘staggering growth’ in online searches for foods with functional benefits: report:  What foods are consumers looking to during coronavirus?…Read more
• Panic buying of immune products causes shortfalls; greater supply gaps loom in months ahead:  A pulse of supply and production issues caused by the COVID-19 crisis is making its way through the dietary supplement industry. Inventories of botanical ingredients continue to hold up, but unprecedented demand for immunity boosting products is causing some strain…. Read more
• Fight COVID-19 with dairy: China industry associations issue consumption guidelines to ‘build immune resistance’:  Four major dairy industry associations in China have formed a set of guidelines for dairy and dairy product consumption for local residents in hopes of strengthening public immune resistance to combat the recent COVID-19 novel coronavirus outbreak…. Read more
• COVID-19: Opportunities for health supplement firms to communicate immune-boosting role of micronutrients:  A panel of science researchers has put up a list of key findings on the role of micronutrients in supporting the immune system, which firms can tap on to educate the consumers in light of the coronavirus outbreak…. Read more
• COVID-19 brings strong China online sales for ANZ’s Comvita and AuMake:  Australia and New Zealand health foods companies are seeing strong online sales of immune boosting supplements from the China market…. Read more

Who profits from this?

• Could coronavirus hasten high times for CBD?  We’ve seen a run on toilet rolls, hand sanitizer and pasta. What about other foods and ingredients? Which might be set to be boosted by coronavirus?… Read more
• Trump encourages fast food brands to keep drive-thru open: so says QSR (Quick Service Restaurant) magazine.
• The ripple effects of COVID-19: A look into global dairy:  Rabobank assesses how the ‘corona hangover’ will impact global dairy markets in its latest report. Demand in China is already starting to bounce back after its virus exposure seems to have peaked, while the US will suffer in the coming months as cases rise…. Read more  
• Coronavirus concerns drive huge sales growth for pantry staples:  As U.S. consumers prepare for long isolation periods to slow the spread of the virus, Nielsen says the nation is in a potentially transformative pattern.
• ‘The change in consumer behaviour are the likes of which we have never seen’: Coronavirus-demand toys with General Mills’ bottom line:  The Cheerios and Nature’s Valley maker has raised its forecast for 2020, as social distancing efforts aimed at slowing the rapid spread of COVID-19 is causing consumers to stockpile, boosting demand for eat-at-home products like cereals and boredom-busting treats like snack bars…. Read more
• The TTB has authorized distilleries to make hand sanitizers: Due to the Coronavirus 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, the Acting Administrator of the Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau (TTB) has found that it is necessary or desirable to waive provisions of internal revenue law with regard to distilled spirits, and therefore is providing certain exemptions and authorizations to distilled spirits permittees who wish to produce ethanol-based hand sanitizers to address the demand for such products during this emergency.

What else?

• Canadian red meat industry donates $50,000 to coronavirus effort in China:  The Canadian red meat industry has made a $50,000 donation to the Canadian Red Cross to support work with the Red Cross Society of China and its efforts in responding to the coronavirus outbreak….