Currently browsing posts about: Food-industry

If Kellogg’s splitting into two companies and changing its business model makes no sense to you, join the crowd.

Apparently, Kellogg is not selling enough cereal to keep its stockholders happy: ready-to-eat cereal unit sales declined in both 2021 and 2022 by roughly 8.5% and 3.5%,

To try to fix this, Kellogg has split its North American company into two new companies.

• I.  WK Kellogg Co: cereals alone ($2.7 billion in sales in 2022)
• II. Kellanova: snacks and plant-based protein brands ($13 billion).  The company expects 50% of its business to come from five brands: Pringles, Cheez-It, Rice Krispies Treats, Pop-Tarts and Eggo.  It will also sell Kellogg cereals internationally.

Somebody has to explain to me why this will make a difference.

• More focused attention on cereals?
• Hope that some bigger company will buy one of these?
• Stock splits for investors?

Will this do anything for Kellogg’s customer base?  Seems doubtful, but let’s wait and see.

Stay tuned.

I can hardly believe this, and had to laugh when I read all the articles last week about how worried the food industry is about the new obesity drugs.

Imagine: if the drugs really do reduce appetite and interest in food—horror of horrors—people might eat less.

Eating less, as I have pointed out repeatedly, is very bad for the food business.

In Food Politics, I explained how the fundamental purpose of  food companies is to get you to eat more food, not less.

Beginning in the early 1980s, food companies did a better job of creating an “eat more” food environment.

People responded to this environment by eating more calories—lots more—and way more than enough to account for the rising prevalence of overweight and obesity.  Evidence?   See my book with Mal Nesheim, Why Calories Count: From Science to Politics.

When I am at my most cynical, I ask this question: What industry might benefit if people ate more healthfully?

I am hard pressed to think of any—certainly not the food, diet, or diet-drug industries (Novo Nordisk, maker of the semaglutide drug, Wegovy, now makes more than the gross domestic product of Denmark).

The only exception I can think of is not-for-profit HMO’s like Kaiser Permanente, which do better if their patients are healthier (and have no excuse for not paying their workers better).

Anything that helps people eat less and more healthfully is bad news for the food industry, and especially for companies making ultra-processed junk food.

No wonder companies are worried.

Here’s my collection from last week (with thanks to Lisa Young and Michele Simon for making sure I saw these articles):

• Wall Street Journal: America’s Food Giants Confront the Ozempic Era
• Yahoo Finance: Ozempic Is Making People Buy Less Food, Walmart Says
• Bloomberg News: If Ozempic Leads People to Eat Less, Maker of Cheez-It Will Be Ready
• Yahoo Finance: Snack-maker Conagra may tweak portions as weight-loss drugs alter appetites
• Washington Post:  Food, clothing, airlines: Ozempic is coming for these industries and more
• Yahoo Finance: Surge in obesity drugs like Ozempic has pummeled big food stocks. Is it time to eat them up?
• Food Fix:  Why Ozempic makes Wall Street woozy
• PepsiCo: PepsiCo monitoring impact of weight loss drugs, but says early impact on sales is ‘negligible’

Well here’s a big surprise.  The USDA is taking a look at concentration in agribusiness.

TODAY: Webinar at 1:00 p.m. ET.  Register here.

Here’s what this is about:

This report details issues surrounding market concentration in agribusiness, particularly in three agribusiness sectors where concentration has increased over time: seeds, meatpacking, and food retail. Market concentration and its impact on competition have attracted growing public scrutiny. Critics argue that many industries have grown too concentrated, with fewer firms competing with one another and a consequent weakening of competition. The report covers the consolidation in each of these industries, explains the driving forces behind increased concentration, and examines public policies aimed at encouraging competition, focusing on the implementation of merger policy.

This report has lots of interesting tidbits about those three industries.

• Two firms, DuPont Pioneer and Monsanto, control 71.6% of U.S. corn and 65.9% of U.S. soybeans.
• Four U.S. meat firms (not necessarily the same ones) control 85% of steers and heifers, 67% of hogs, 55% of turkeys, and 53% of chickens.

But what is shocking to me about this report is what it does not say.

It does not refer to or even cite Phil Howard’s book: Concentration and Power in the Food System: Who Controls What We Eat?

I wrote about Howard’s book when it came out in a new edition.

How could the USDA’s economists fail to mention Howard’s analysis of the global seed industry (since updated).

It’s great the USDA is taking this on.  But if you really want to know what’s going on in industry concentration, read Phil Howard’s book first.

Last week, I attended and spoke at the UNICEF-WHO Global Congress on Implementation of the International Code of Marketing of Breast-Milk Substitutes at WHO headquarters in Geneva.

The meeting was attended by more than 400 government, health, and advocacy representatives from more than 100 countries.  Representatives of infant formula companies were not invited to participate.

Its purpose was to encourage governments to promote and enforce the International Code, which nearly all U.N. member states ratified and committed to in 1981 (the U.S. was a long-standing holdout).

This meant they would control inappropriate marketing of infant formulas by banning advertising to people who are pregnant or nursing, gifts of formula samples, and doing anything to make formula appear superior to breastfeeding.

The logic of the Congress:

• Breastfeeding is the superior method for feeding human babies.
• Successful breastfeeding requires support from families, society, and government.
• It is quite easy to undermine confidence in the ability to breastfeed.
• Formula companies do all they can to undermine confidence in breastfeeding.
• Formula companies’ main goal is to sell more formula.
• Formula companies promote their products as normal and superior.
• Breastfeeding is easier when formula marketing is controlled.y

I talked about the food industry “playbook”—strategies and tactics used by industries (tobacco, chemical, drug, alcohol, and food as well as infant formula) to cast doubt on unfavorable research, fund their own research, and lobby against public health recommendations (photo: Arum Gupta).

Many country representatives discussed the effects of the playbook in their areas, and what they are trying to do to stop formula companies from using  the playbook to get around the Code.

The general consensus:  Formula companies should NOT be allowed to:

• Advertise or market products in violation of the Code.
• Participate in public health policymaking.
• Partner with relevant government agencies or non-governmental groups.

Obviously, formula companies are not happy with such recommendations.  If you would like to see an example of the playbook in action, take a look at the response  from the International Special Dietary Foods Industries.

It was exciting to be with so many people who cared so deeply about this issue.

Resources

• WHO Breastfeeding page
• WHO International Code FAQ
• The Global Breastfeeding Collective

A member of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics, the professional association for Registered Dietitian Nutritionists, sent me this emailed announcement from Pork & Partners, a program of the National Pork Board Checkoff.

The accompanying message:

A Friend To All Foods + CPEUs for You!

Pork & Partners is an exciting new community for RDNs, tailored to help you meet your professional needs. Become a Partner to access free CPEU opportunities, fresh lean pork recipes, client resources, research, and so much more. Join today!

CPEUs are continuing professional education units, required for maintaining dietetic registration.   Dietitians usually pay for continuing education.

It’s so generous of the National Pork Board to offer free credits:

Introducing Pork & Partners, your new communityfocused on the needs of nutrition professionals. We’re here to provide free continuing education opportunities, exciting events, featured recipes, evidence-based handouts and peer-reviewed research. Join us to access resources and support to take your practice to the next level.

The Pork & Partners website emphasizes the nutrition, health, sustainability, and cleanliness of pig production.

I couldn’t find anything on the site about confinement of pregnant sows, the subject of a recent Supreme Court decision, or the many lawsuits over offensive odors from pig CAFOs.

Pork producers must not want dietitians talking about such things.  Hence: free CPEUs.

This article in Feed & Grain caught my attention: Cargill intends to sell its poultry business in China to private equity firm DCP Capital, according to reports.

Cargill is the tenth largest broiler producer in the world; it was responsible for the slaughter of an astonishing 625 million broilers last year, of which 49 million were in China.

You don’t hear much about Cargill because it is not publicly traded.  It is family held, but huge:  155,000 employees, annual revenues of more than $134 billion.

It makes that money from food oils, ingredients, grains, oilseeds, cotton, animal feed, and financial services.

According to this article,

Cargill in 2013 inaugurated its integrated poultry operation in Lai’an, Anhui, China, which included every stage of the supply chain: breeding, raising, feed production, hatching, slaughtering and processing…The company also opened a new US$48 million poultry complex in Chuzhou, Anhui, in 2019. That operation included breeding, raising, feed production, hatching and primary and further processing capabilities.

Now, Cargill is selling off its Chinese enterprises to venture capital.

Cargill must think it best to get out of China.

The venture capital company must think money can still be made there.

This, it seems to me, is an example of what is happening to the global food supply.

It is no longer about making sure that people have enough to eat and do not go hungry.

Food is about making money for investors.

That means keeping costs as low as possible, regardless of the effects on health or the environment.

A reader sent me a PepsiCo job announcement sent to dietitians.

CONTRACTOR, SENIOR SCIENTIST: LIFE SCIENCES, SCIENTIFIC ENGAGEMENT TEAM

The PepsiCo Life Sciences Engagement Team is responsible for strategic coordination and execution of Life Science related internal and external science communication and partnership programs to help achieve growth by transforming our product portfolio to meet our PEP+ goals for added sugars, saturated fat and sodium reduction.

We are looking for a Senior Scientist to support our team that drives engagement to build external scientific credibility of our brands among key opinion leaders and consumer influencers and to help deliver internal education to equip our PepsiCo colleagues with relevant nutrition knowledge about our portfolio transformation journey.

Among the job responsibilities are to work on:

• The AND conference and expo (the exhibits) in Denver, October 2023
• Education tools and messages for PepsiCo Life Science
  Social media, website
• Competitor assessment on scientific communications
• Educational materials related to sports nutrition and hydration

The job requires

• Master’s degreMe in nutrition or a closely related field
• Registered Dietitian preferred, but not required
• 0-2 years of experience at a major food manufacturer or related experience (recent graduate acceptable)

Pepsi Life Sciences offers continuing education credits to dietitians.  Examples:

• Unpacking Preconceptions About Packaged Foods
• The Science of Sweetness: Taste and Learn

Comment

• PepsiCo may own Quaker Oats, but most of its products are ultra-processed and best minimized or avoided.
• Dietitians ought to be advising clients and the public to avoid ultra-processed foods (especially sugary drinks). from PepsiCo.
• PepsiCo employs dietitians.  That way it can boast about its nutrition initiatives.
• Dietitians who choose to work for PepsiCo are co-opted; they become part of the company’s marketing initiatives.

I just hope the job pays really well.

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