How big is the problem of childhood obesity?

Just how big is childhood obesity in the country?

BIG! So big that a concerned environmental group (a lot of them parents), supporting the government’s drive for healthy and nutritious foods served in schools, hugely welcomed a global effort to monitor the selling/marketing of food to school children in view of the rising incidence of childhood obesity in the Philippines.

We owe a humongous thank you, says EcoWaste Coalition, to Consumers International (CI), a worldwide federation of consumer groups, for coming up with a manual that can assist policy makers and citizens in gathering evidence on the marketing of unhealthy foods to kids.

Of course, anxious parents are ever on the lookout for what their children eat not just at home but also outside the home — in school and in the streets. 

And what is eat all about? The Manual for Monitoring Food Marketing to Children is designed to expose the multi-billion-dollar promotion of products that are high in fat, sugar or salt to children by the food and beverage industry. It gives street-smart, down-to-earth advice on how to set standard definitions of marketing to children, including the classification of unhealthy foods and beverages, as well as how to conduct the analysis and interpret the collected data. It details the range of marketing techniques to help researchers identify subtle, as well as conspicuous promotions. 

Dr. Leah Primitiva Samaco-Paquiz, a university educator and vice president of EcoWaste Coalition, happily announces, “We welcome the timely release of this monitoring tool that can help the authorities in crafting a policy to halt the unethical promotion of unhealthy foods and beverages to children, which can lead to obesity and to serious ailments such as diabetes and heart disease later in life.”

Helen McCallum, Consumers International acting director general notes, “Companies invest millions in promoting their unhealthy products to children, using traditional advertising and a range of more subtle techniques online and in schools. This manual is a small, but significant, step in exposing the junk food industry’s efforts to influence our children’s dietary choices.” 

The manual was launched Monday in London ahead of the UN high-level summit on non-communicable diseases (NCDs) in New York on September 19-20.

 In a statement, the UK-based CI official says, “As health ministers gather ahead of the UN summit in New York, we call on governments and civil society organisations to use this manual to help inform health policies that can have a real impact on the rising levels of obesity.” 

The summit will highlight the current lack of concerted action to tackle the shocking/disturbing levels of obesity worldwide, and their impact on rates of critical illnesses such as heart disease and diabetes.

It’s indeed shocking to hear this WHO report: The incidence of obesity in the country is on a steady climb, with more than three million Filipino children classified as “overweight obese.”

Worldwide, there are an estimated 170 million school-aged children who are overweight or obese. Meanwhile 43 million pre-school children are already obese. So much for starting ’em young.

In its website, Nutritionist-Dietitians’ Association of the Philippines writes, “Overweight and obesity are now impending health crises” in the Philippines.”

At the beginning of this year, Education Secretary Armin Luistro threw his support around a WHO recommendation banning junk foods in schools and playgrounds to promote healthy diet and curb obesity among school-aged kids.

At the 63rd World Health Assembly (WHA) held in May 2010, governments adopted a “set of recommendations on the marketing of foods and non-alcoholic beverages to children.” The WHO recommendations urge member states to implement policies with “to reduce the impact of marketing of foods high in saturated fats, trans-fatty acids, free sugars, or salt to children” by addressing the dimensions of “exposure” and ”power” of marketing of foods to children.

The EcoWaste Coalition earlier urged DepEd to go further by embarking on a holistic program that will promote a healthy school community conducive to well-rounded and well-balanced learning and development.

   A big move towards solving this problem that threatens to get even bigger.

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Bugged by plastic bags

Dear Consumerline,

The problem about plastic bags never seems to end, indeed bugging us to our wits’ end.  Solutions after solutions have been offered in the form of new components to make them biodegradable.  Of course, proponents have all the noble thoughts of helping promote green environment, but not without material gain.  Considering the ever mushrooming of malls and supermarkets, why a lucky supplier of this indispensable non-descript, oftentimes throw-away item could easily secure his future here and perhaps forego his plan of joining the caravan of forlorn OFWs!  With this in mind, I mean the lucrative side of producing said much-needed shopping or marketing aid, why can’t our handicraft producers take advantage of the situation and raise their income?  Way back in the ’70s, right after I was martial-lawed out of my job, I went into handicraft exporting, when a German importer approached me to ask if I could supply him with such an inexpensive but biodegradable shopping bag made from our local indigenous material.  Bedazzling me with a mouthwatering probable initial order, I went full-speed ahead to look for the would-be producers in Bicol and Quezon provinces where the supply of abaca, buri, and pandan, the materials needed, abound.  I then closed the deal and made the delivery in time, and here I am now wondering why so much fuss is being made out of the innocent bag.  The trouble perhaps stems from the present high-tech mindedness of our entrepreneurs, which is none the least commendable in the proper perspective, that tends to filter them away from the basic awareness of the latent richness of our native resources that have been conveniently ignored in favor of that almighty source-oriented IT.  The government and the media should re-start and pick up from where they left off years ago before the advent of the IT to re-educate our people in the countryside about the natural bounty of our land and forest, and the wealth-in-waiting they could tap with their well-directed industry.  Having said this mouthful, I look forward to saying BUGS-OFF to the incessant complaint about non-biodegradable plastic bags and welcome to bags galore for the biodegradable one made from our local indigenous material.

— Rem Maclang

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