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  • A critical examination of Food Industry Partnerships and Practices

A critical examination of Food Industry Partnerships and Practices

  • 19 Apr 2022
  • 12:00 PM - 1:00 PM
  • Webinar

About this event

***Zoom link will be shared two hours prior to the meeting to everyone who registers***

This panel is co-hosted by the Centre for Global Health, Dalla Lana School of Public Health and the Lawrence S. Bloomberg Faculty of Nursing at the University of Toronto.

Participants that attend all of the events in this series will receive a certificate of completion.

Seminar Schedule

  • April 19 - Seminar 6: A critical examination of Food Industry Partnerships and Practices

About This Series

The corporation is arguably the most powerful social and economic institution globally, with unprecedented power to shape scientific evidence, public policy, and lifestyles. Corporations share practices including advertising, public relations, and lobbying that are common across industries and which impact population health and health equity. For example, non-communicable diseases (NCDs) are currently the leading cause of mortality globally and account for 71% of all deaths according to the World Health Organization (WHO).1 The main risk factors for developing NCDs as identified by the WHO include harmful alcohol drinking, tobacco use, physical inactivity, and the consumption of unhealthy diets rich in overly processed foods.2 The United Nations has addressed NCDs in their Sustainable Development Goal target 3.4, which is to reduce premature mortality from NCDs by a third by 2030.3 At the same time, medically-related industry, including pharmaceutical, medical device, infant formula, and health technology companies have pervasive influence over the production of health evidence, the dissemination of health innovations, and the development of clinical practice and health policy. Critical public health analysis of the power of the corporate sector in influencing public health outcomes informed the field referred to as the commercial determinants of health. The Lancet Global Health defines the commercial determinants of health as “strategies and approaches used by the private sector to promote products and choices that are detrimental to health”.4 Corporate practices can thus be critically examined and strategically challenged in order to contribute to healthy, evidence-based public policy solutions. The Dalla Lana School of Public Health’s Centre for Global Health in partnership with the Lawrence S. Bloomberg Faculty of Nursing at the University of Toronto are hosting a seminar series entitled Health Inc: Corporations, capitalism, and the commercial determinants of health. The objective of this seminar series is to create a forum to promote conversations, research training and collaboration across sectors and disciplines regarding the impact of corporations on health. Themes that will be explored during the seminar series include but are not limited to industry’s role in harm reduction, public-private partnerships, conflicts of interests, industry sponsorship and conduct of research, health data and data justice, sustainable health care, and the role of corporations in the climate crisis and inequities.

1. World Health Organization. Non communicable diseases. World Health Organization; 2021.

2. World Health Organization. Noncommunicable diseases country profiles 2018. Geneva, Switzerland: World Health Organization; 2018.

3. NCD Countdown 2030 collaborators. (2020). NCD Countdown 2030: pathways to achieving Sustainable Development Goal target 3.4. Lancet Public Health. 396(10255): 918-934 https://doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(20)31761-X

4. Kickbusch, I., Allen, L., Franz, C. (2016). The commercial determinates of health. Lancet. 4(12): 895-896, https://doi.org/10.1016/S2214-109X(16)30217-0

UPCOMING SEMINAR

About Seminar six - April 19th, 2022 12pm-1pm

Title: A critical examination of Food Industry Partnerships and Practices

The corporation is arguably the most powerful social and economic institution globally, with unprecedented power to shape scientific evidence, public policy, and lifestyles such as dietary behaviours. In this seminar, we feature two speakers who will 1) critically interrogate the positioning of the food industry as a legitimate partner for the public sector and the resulting impacts; and, 2) explore the challenges with voluntary commitments, which maximize flexibility for the food industry, but that can impede the creation of a healthier food supply and food environment.

Speaker #1

Cécile Knai is Professor of Public Health Policy at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine. She is one of the leads of the newly established LSHTM Commercial Determinants Research Group. Her widely published and internationally recognised research comprises analyses of policy governance arrangements, policy evaluations, and how unhealthy commodity industries (UCIs) work to shape public health policies, with a particular focus on food (but also increasingly across UCIs). This includes a current project synthesising the effectiveness of different governance arrangements (mandatory, voluntary, or partnerships) of population interventions to improve diet. It also includes leadership in conflict of interest management guidance, for example her role as chair of the UKPRP-funded SPECTRUM consortium on the commercial determinants of health’s Interactions and Interests Review Group, and her current development of conflict of interest management guidance for LSHTM staff. She is one of the organisers of a new LSHTM Short Course on Conducting Research on the Commercial Determinants of Health (20-24 June 2022). She also leads other programmes of research, including the public health policy arm of the LSHTM Policy Innovation and Evaluation Research Unit (PIRU), and the LSHTM team of an European Commission-funded project on systems thinking to address adolescent obesity, and holds a range of editorial and committee roles.

Abstract

The normalisation of ineffective partnerships between the food industry and government to improve diets

The food industry uses the rhetoric of collaboration to normalise its role in research and policy. One of the most complex aspects of this phenomenon is the industry's positioning as a legitimate partner in global food and nutrition. This has led to the increasing acceptance of arrangements such as public-private partnerships to improve health, and voluntary mechanisms whereby commercial actors design and monitor their own standards of conduct. This seminar explores these themes and shares empirical evidence of the effectiveness of such approaches, and the complex industry strategies supporting them.

Speaker #2

Dr. Laura Vergeer is the Research Programs Officer in the Department of Nutritional Sciences at the University of Toronto, where she earned her PhD in 2021. Her thesis compared the product (re)formulation actions and commitments of the top packaged food and beverage companies in Canada and was completed under the supervision of Dr. Mary L’Abbé. Dr. Vergeer has also led or contributed to studies on food company nutrition policies, food processing, food marketing to children, food prices, dietary practices, nutrient profiling and nutrition labelling. As a graduate student, she received the CIHR Canada Graduate Scholarship Doctoral Award and the Ontario Graduate Scholarship, as well as research and leadership awards from the Canadian Nutrition Society, Obesity Canada and the University of Toronto. Dr. Vergeer also completed the Collaborative Specialization in Public Health Policy through the Dalla Lana School of Public Health.

Abstract

The effectiveness of voluntary food company commitments in helping to create a healthier Canadian food supply

The packaged food supply in Canada is dominated by energy-dense products high in nutrients of public health concern, increasing Canadians’ risk of developing obesity and non-communicable diseases. Many packaged food and beverage companies voluntarily commit to improving the nutritional quality of their products; monitoring is needed to hold companies accountable for these commitments and thereby prompt improvements. Recent studies indicate that many of Canada’s leading packaged food and beverage companies have not made meaningful improvements to the nutritional quality of their products in the last few years; however, there is considerable variation between companies in terms of their product (re)formulation actions and commitments. This presentation will give an overview of these findings and highlight challenges with voluntary commitments in creating a healthier Canadian food supply and food environment.


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