If Michelle Obama can do it, why can't Indian celebs be equally responsive.

Film star Madhuri Dixit in one the ads for Maggi noodles 

US First lady Michelle Obama is a celebrity.  Not only as US President Barack Obama’s wife, she has also successfully carved out a niche for herself in the international arena. With that image, she could have easily earned tonnes of money by endorsing popular brands, including processed foods.

Michelle Obama instead focused her energies on fighting junk food ads of sugary breakfast cereals, soft drinks and fast food aimed at school children. Five years after she launched a nationwide campaign called “Let’s Move!” the US Department of Agriculture had last year phased out junk food advertisements from vending machines in schools across the country. Even billboards of Coke and Pepsi were removed from school eateries. The big retail giant Walmart has promised to reduce salt content in its products by 25 per cent and sugar by 10 per cent.

Childhood obesity is emerging as a huge problem in America with obesity rates among those between 2 and 19 years being as high as 17 per cent.

If Michelle Obama can stand up to fight obesity, which is emerging as the major reason leading to health debacles and even fatalities in the US, I see no reason why Indian celebrities – and that includes film actors like Amitabh Bachchan, Madhuri Dixit, Priety Zinta, Kareena Kapoor, Ranbir Kapoor and cricketers like Sachin Tendulkar, MS Dhoni and Virat Kohli to name a few – are not equally concerned and responsive. I agree it is not possible for stars to check the ingredients used, but at least they know what they are repeatedly endorsing is not healthy.

When Madhuri Dixit becomes a brand ambassador for a ‘nutritious’ Magginoodles, she immensely influences the psyche of the modern age mothers. My own neighbor, a young mother, is at ease when she feeds her little son with 2-minute Maggi noodles every other afternoon. She has perhaps reduced the intake after I tried to reason out with her, but still she is comfortable as long as Madhuri Dixit endorses the product. I am sure similar stories abound everywhere, and therefore a celebrity just can’t get away by saying that it is the manufacturer who should be answerable and not the person endorsing it.

An insightful news report in the web magazine Scroll.in (http://scroll.in/article/728525/junk-food-is-feeding-a-malnutrition-epidemic-in-delhis-slums) says it all: “Food is cooked twice at home: rice, roti, dal [mostly masoor since it’s the cheapest], sabzi [mostly potatoes], but never green leafy vegetables or fruit or milk. Meals are interspersed with Maggi, popcorn and a variety of chips, which kill the appetite for a full meal. It isn't just that children like their taste, there is an economic rationale to rely on junk food. A packet of Maggi noodles costs Rs 10 while a meal of rice, dal and vegetables would cost approximately three times that amount.” More consumption of junk foods among children leads to malnutrition and stunted growth. Quoting a CRY study, the report says that 36% children suffer from malnutrition and another 33% are victims of severe acute malnutrition that could lead to abnormalities and even death.

BBC journalist Jeremy Paxmn (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DWLQaz8nhQw) shocked the head of Coke Europe in 2013 when he poured sugar sachtes from typical containers of soft drinks that are served in cinema halls to show how consumers unknowingly gulp extremely high levels of sugar while watching films. Each big container carries sugar equal to 44 sachets and the small container has 23 sachets. Although the cola giants have been promising to reduce sugar content, the fact remains that soft drinks are harmful for health. Michelle Obama is therefore right in wanting the school children to remain away from soft drinks. Her campaign is slowly making an impact. At least obesity levels in children between the age of 2 and 5 are coming down in America.

The Maggi controversy has once again brought the focus on celebrity endorsements. I am waiting for the day when more Indian celebrities demonstrate social consciousness like what has been shown by Aamir Khan, Mahesh Bhatt, Shekhar Kapoor and Kangana Ranaut. They can’t remain mere puppets on a financial string. In a country where they are treated like demi gods, they have to take on the bigger role on the lines of Michelle Obama. That’s like a true celebrity.

Like Yoga, it’s time for an International Day of Safe Food

Not only yoga, with health problems accentuating in the recent past, the trend is also increasingly moving towards safe food. But while the popularity of yoga received a shot in the arm when Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s suggestion of celebrating an International Day of Yoga was accepted by the UN, safe food has yet to get a political backing.

Although Michelle Obama has taken to organic farming in the premises of the White House, and is known to serve chemical-free food to guests, she has still not been able to convince the UN to have a special day marked for safe food. Nevertheless, the preference and intake for non-chemical farm produce has grown globally over the years, and is growing at a phenomenal pace.

According to the Soil Association’s Organic Market Report 2013 sale of organic food has grown by more than 25 per cent since 2008. While in the US it is expected to grow at a compound annual growth rate of 14 per cent between 2014 and 2018; in India too, the growth looks very promising.

The Indian organic food market is likely to grow by a phenomenal annual compound growth rate of 19 per cent between 2012 and 2016.

Interestingly, not everyone keen on organic food is banking upon an organic certification. For several decades now I have seen farmers in Punjab and Haryana, comprising the wheat bowl of the country, keep a small patch of cultivated land free of chemical pesticides and fertilizers for home consumption. While they drench the crops meant for the market with whole lot of pesticides, they ensure safe food for their own consumption.

I have also watched with interest a silent food revolution taking place. In the entire northwestern parts of the country, more and more households are relying on organic wheat – the Sharbati variety – coming from Madhya Pradesh. The organic wheat that is being imported from MP comes with no certificate. It is only through goodwill and faith that people are willing to pay a higher price for what they are told is a better quality produce. The atta from Sharbati wheat is relatively expensive but people are willing to pay a price for healthy food.

Several years back, India Today (Oct 15, 2007) had reported on its growing appeal in the metros. In a report entitled Grains of Gold, http://indiatoday.intoday.in/story/Grains+of+gold/1/1561.html) it wrote: "India's granary Punjab still produces the lion's share of the country's wheat. But when it comes to taste, quality and other attributes, Madhya Pradesh's Sharbati tops the charts in demand in the metros. The lustrous, golden-hued grain commands premium price, being re-christened golden or premium wheat in wholesale and retail markets of Mumbai, Pune, Ahmedabad and Hyderabad or simply, MP wheat in major North Indian markets like Delhi.” 

The primary reason behind the increasing consumer preference for non-chemical food products are the resulting health impacts. More and more people now realize that most babies born today carry persistent pesticides and other chemicals in their bodies. Lately, scientists have found 21 different chemicals in umbilical cord blood. With lifestyle diseases becoming more and more common, people are linking it to the food they eat. So whether we like it or not, the world is quietly moving towards safe food.

This will require changes at two levels. First of all, there are essentially two kinds of improved crops that have been developed by agricultural scientists: the high-yielding varieties (HYV) that need chemical pesticides to be sprayed to take care of insects and pests; and the genetically-modified (GM) crops that creates poison within the plant to kill certain kinds of insects, and at the same time require potent chemicals to be sprayed from outside too keep the other pests under control. Agricultural scientists need to now shift research focus towards organic breeding of crop varieties, which means developing crop varieties that are responsive to organic farming methods. 

Secondly, it’s time that the government steps in to encourage farmers to move towards non-chemical agriculture. Every year, huge stocks of wheat in Punjab and Haryana are spoiled in storage. At the same time, huge quantity of Sharbati wheat is imported from Madhya Pradesh to meet the local demand.

You will agree it will make tremendous economic sense for the Punjab (and also for Haryana) governments to encourage farmers to grow wheat without chemicals to cater to the growing local preference rather than allow its chemically-infested wheat to rot. And I see no reason why this can’t be done. If Punjab government can provide a subsidy of Rs 4,000 per acre for the paddy farmers to shift to cotton cultivation, I am sure a similar amount can be provided to wheat farmers to shift from chemical farming to non-chemical farming.   

Source: Like Yoga, it's time for an International Day of Safe Food
http://www.abplive.in/india/2015/01/07/article471236.ece/Like-Yoga-it%E2%80%99s-time-for-an-International-Day-of-Safe-Food

US emerging as the world's largest cancer economy.

Is the US emerging as the world's largest cancer economy? Well, when I say a cancer economy what I mean is an economy sustained to a larger extent by the growing incidence of the killer disease. The more is the incidence of cancer, the more is the medical costs involved, and that adds on to the country's GDP. It's obviously a drain on the society but at the same time for the medical industry it provides an immense business opportunity. And some would say a profiteering medical industry will provide for more jobs !

In 2008, the US National Institute of Health (NIH) estimated the total annual cost that cancer was causing to the economy at $ 201.5 billion, which included $ 77.4 billion of health expenditures and $ 124 billion as the indirect mortality costs. After all, in a country where more than half a million people are expected to die of cancer this year, and that works out to 1,600 every day, nearly 75 per cent of the health care costs revolve around the cancer epidemic.

This startling analysis is presented in a blog Inspired Bites written by Robyn O' Brian (Link: http://blogs.prevention.com/inspired-bites/2013/11/18/how-the-cost-of-cancer-is-eating-our-economy/) that I came across yesterday. Quoting a report of the President's Cancer Panel she writes: " (The Panel) is urging all of us to do our part to reduce the burden of this disease.  Most notably, they encourage all Americans to reduce their exposures to contaminants like pesticides, insecticides and other chemicals now so pervasive in our food.  Why? Because 41 per cent of us are expected to get cancer in our lifetimes, 1 in 2 men and 1 in 3 women. It did not used to be this way.  And can we really eat to beat this disease as the President’s Cancer Panel suggests? It’s tough to do with a food supply so dependent on synthetic chemicals.  In the last fifteen years, new ingredients, synthetically engineered in laboratories to withstand increasing doses of toxic weedkillers, have quietly been inserted into our food.  And while correlation is not causation, the soaring use of these chemicals corresponds so directly with the soaring rates of certain cancers that at the very least, it merits an investigation."

Although, as she says, while correlation is not causation, there is a definitely a growth pattern that is clearly visible. Food contamination is certainly linked to the growing incidence of cancer. And if the Panel itself is suggesting to people to be watchful of pesticides, insecticides and other chemicals in food, the indications are loud and clear. I would have however expected more serious efforts visible in America to curb the use of chemicals, including pesticides and insecticides, based on the recommendations of this report. The failure to take the report seriously is not only disappointing but if I may be allowed to say so it is reflective of a criminal neglect. 

Especially at a time when US President Barack Obama has been trying to push for medicare, I thought the best way to prevent the disease from taking such a massive human toll in future would have been to go in for safe food. When Michelle Obama launch organic gardening in the White House complex, she obviously conveyed a powerful statement, but her husband failed to get the message right. As Charles Benbrook has conclusively shown that between 1996 and 2011, an era when GM crops proliferated in the US, the application of pesticides has risen by 404 million pounds. This data alone should have forced the US Department of Agriculture to come down heavily on the industrial farming systems. 

While the USDA continues to push for more of the same, the US President has been trying his best to push the harmful technologies to the developing world. His global food security initiative promotes the faulty and harmful technological approach as the mankind's saviour. This is where the US President fails, and fails miserably. In his desperation to find ways and means (even if these are harmful in the long run) to jack up the economy, he is trying to create conditions for the US health care industry to profit. He is aggressively using the g-20 to push his flawed economic approach. And that makes me wonder when will the world get a political leader who looks beyond the financial capital; who goes all out to build on the human capital.  

Till then, I can only pray for the well-being of Americans. If 1 in 2 men, and 1 in 3 women is expected to live with cancer in the years to come, God save America. But please don't pass on this deadly killer to the developing world. We already have enough problems at hand.