Food Processing - November 2007 - (Page 7)

E D I T O R ’ S P L AT E NOVEMBER 2007 • Volume 68, No. 11 www.foodprocessing.com 555 W. Pierce Road, Ste. 301, Itasca, IL 60143 Phone: (630) 467-1300 • Fax: (630) 467-1179 Processors should take the initiative against pseudoscience health reporting. EDITORIAL EDITOR IN ChIEF MANAgINg EDITOR NEWS & TRENDS MANAgINg EDITOR-DIgITAL DAVE FuSARO dfusaro@putman.net DAVID FEDER, RD dfeder@putman.net DIANE TOOPS dtoops@putman.net JILL RuSSELL jrussell@putman.net For public consumption TEChNICAL EDITOR MARk ANThONy, Ph.D. PLANT OPERATIONS EDITOR MIkE PEhANICh PACkAgINg EDITOR kATE BERTRAND CONNOLLy DAVID JOy hOLLIS AShMAN, JACquELINE BECkLEy REPRINTS MARkETINg CLAuDIA STAChOWIAk MANgAgER FOSTER REPRINTS 4295 Ohio Street, Michigan City, IN 46360 866-879-9144, Fax: 219-561-2019 claudia@fostereprints.com REguLAR CONTRIBuTORS REguLATORy CONSuMER uNDERSTANDINg E ditor Dave Fusaro is out of the country, so I’m using his column this month. I’m glad for the soapbox, because two things happened recently that could signal a major shift in how the public perceives processed foods. On Oct. 9, New York Times science editor John Tierney wrote on the “information cascade.” That’s a sound-bite reduction of, “If you repeat a lie often enough, it becomes the truth.” Tierney’s article, “Diet and Fat: A Severe Case of Mistaken Consensus,” is an eye-opening look at health myths which, through the repetition of agendized propaganda, are accepted as fact. In Food Processing and its sister publication, Wellness Foods, we’ve written much on the “fat is evil, corn syrup is deadly, sodium kills” canards. What makes Tierney’s report so significant, other than being well-written, is its arrival at a time the public is ripe for the message. Then there are the decades of misinformation – often deliberate – about sodium. (A sterling example appeared the same day as Tierney’s New York Times piece but in the Chicago Tribune. Covering a twopage spread, “Worth your salt?” spouted the formulaic, panic-inducing pseudoscience typical of sodium coverage.) “Well-funded salt opponents are rolling out new studies at a furious pace, but the numbers don’t add up – literally,” says Richard Hanneman, president of Salt Institute in Alexandria, Va. This brings us to the second incident an unexpected coda to the corruption of science for personalized interest. While the FDA is holding a public hearing on sodium on Nov. 29, as sort of a preamble, GMA/FPA and the Center for Science in the Public Interest co-sponsored a conference on salt last month. “Perhaps GMA/FPA and CSPI expected the delegation to come back with recommendations to cut sodium in new food products or to provide government incentives to produce low-sodium foods or even craft some vast ‘social marketing’ approach to convince Americans to eat less sodium,” posits Hanneman. “But a funny thing happened after all these options were identified and discussed: The delegates overwhelmingly voted to encourage a broad approach to improving diet quality and rejecting, specifically, an approach targeting single nutrients such as sodium.” Although nutrition misinformation is an issue that must be addressed by media and government, it also is incumbent upon processors to make better use of same. Processors must be prepared to attack bad science, and bad science reporting, proactively, and with real information. Honest food, nutrition and health experts always have endorsed adhering to a science-based approach to nutrition guidelines. And that means all of the science, not just the cherry-picked stuff. A solid approach that reaches out to popular media with facts is needed. It’s time to give up on the industry standard of “reaction.” That only reduces such agendized controversies into “we said/ they said” sound bites. Processors will lose that one every time. DESIGN & PRODUCTION gROuP ART DIRECTOR ART DIRECTOR ART DIRECTOR PRODuCTION MANAgER STEPhEN C. hERNER sherner@putman.net JASON VARgAS jvargas@putman.net JENNIFER DAkAS jdakas@putman.net RITA M. FITzgERALD rfitzgerald@putman.net PUBLISHING PuBLIShER kAy ROSS-BAkER kross-baker@putman.net ADMINISTRATIVE STAFF PRESIDENT AND CEO JOhN CAPPELLETTI VICE PRESIDENT JuLIE CAPPELLETTI-LANgE VICE PRESIDENT OF CONTENT kEITh LARSON VICE PRESIDENT CIRCuLATION JERRy CLARk CIRCuLATION MANAgER PATRICIA DONATIu EDITORIAL ADVISORy BOARD ChERyL J. BALDWIN, Ph.D. Senior Scientist, kraft Foods gERRy gOMOLkA Vice President-Process Engineering The Stellar group Analyst, Ag Edwards & Sons Inc. Vice President-Engineering Sara Lee Foods National Food & Beverage Industry Leader, grant Thornton LLP ChRISTOPhER gROWE DAVE kRAMER DEXTER MANNINg WILLIAM MCCABE Vice President-Ice Cream, Smith Dairy DON NugENT JAMES RICE DARyL ThOMAS ELAINE WEDRAL, Ph.D. President/CEO, graceland Fruit Inc. VP & general Mgr.-China Operations, Tyson Foods Inc. Vice President-Marketing, herr Foods Inc. President (retired), Nestle R&D Center David Feder, R.D., Managing Editor E-mail: dfeder@putman.net NOVEMBER 2007 FOOD PROcEssINg • 7 http://WWW.FOODPROCESSING.COM

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Food Processing - November 2007

Food Processing - November 2007 Contents Editor's Page NewsBites Regulatory Rollout Food Biz Kids Our Favorite Products of 2007 Ingredients Product Development Plant Operations Packaging New Product Profiles Toops Scoops

Food Processing - November 2007

For optimal viewing of this digital publication, please enable JavaScript and then refresh the page. If you would like to try to load the digital publication without using Flash Player detection, please click here.