Last week hidden in the corner of the regular, relentless
news cycle was a news item that the UK had banned
advertising of junk food targeting children from both
print and social media.
The new rules, which come into effect in July 2017, extend
an already existing ban on television ads for “high fat,
salt or sugar (HFSS) food or drink products”. The announcement
is a call to arms against the tasty but potentially dangerous
foods in what is increasingly becoming a mainstream
battle against junk food.
Commonly available HFSS foods or junk foods include carbonated
soft drinks, packaged chips/snacks, chocolates, pizza,
burger, instant noodles, etc. School children are aggressively
targeted through celebrity endorsements; promotional
campaigns, etc. by companies of these food products.
Research has found that that consumption of food high in fat,
salt and sugar (HFSS) has been found to be associated with
many diseases including type 2 diabetes, hypertension and
others. The WHO estimates that as
per the current trend, 70 million
young children will be overweight
or obese by 2025.
While it is no doubt a small step in
the larger war, skeptics are questioning
its efficacy. India too is
waging a war against junk food albeit in baby steps. Maneka
Gandhi, Union Minister for Women and Child Development,
proposed a ban on sale of junk food in school canteens,
as well as within a radius of 200 metres by private vendors
and hawkers during school hours. The FSSAI, also in October
2015, had issued ‘Draft guidelines for making available
wholesome, nutritious, safe and hygienic food to school children
in India’ based on which in January this year the Central
Board of Secondary Education, in a circular to all affiliated
schools, has asked to ensure junk food is not available in the
school canteens.
However, such bans are often considered an easy fix for a complex
problem. In the UK campaigners have pointed out that
the ban has several loopholes which allow it to be implemented
only in those media which has more than 25% of their audience
as children. Regulation in the food sector is rarely thorough,
much less seen to be fair and often left in the hands of
bureaucrats without any serious political will to back it. It is
these regulatory lacunae that advertising takes advantage of
to the detriment of impressionable young minds.
With the problem only likely to get worse, now is the time for
the government to step in. Some forward thinking measures
could include ranking states not just on the traditional parameters
of infant and maternal mortality, birth and death rates
and sex ratio and infectious diseases, but also on the obesity,
prevalence of lifestyle diseases and others.
