THE GREAT CHEESE STORY-WHY AMERICANS ARE OBESE!

Does any government has a role to play in deciding what its citizens must eat or what should not be eaten? This issue received a sharp focus recently when some of pro-active policies are being taken up by governments in a few countries to discourage consumption of patently unhealthy foods. Higher taxation, limiting large sized packs and more forceful labeling regulations have been the chosen routes for achieving the goal of herding the consumers to live more responsibly and avoid social burden through diseases like diabetes, CVD, obesity, cancers etc. The on-going tussle between the farming lobby and consumer interests invariably ends up in favor of the former because of close nexus between agriculture lobby and the governing political class. Here is an interesting commentary by a critic regarding the systematic blows being delivered to the consumers by the American government through some of the most idiotic policy orchestrations to oblige its farming lobbies with almost all multinational giants investing heavily on an agenda of protecting their financial flanks.   

"Also, the Golden Age of Cheese was not purely the result of individual choices. It reflects decades of pro-cheese U.S. agriculture policy. I am not making this up. The nation's cheese binge is a case study in the broader dysfunctionality of federal farm legislation, the latest iteration of which is being debated in Congress. Yes, there are real social trends at work, too. An aging population consumes less milk as fluid and more in solid form; a wealthier population can afford a richer diet, including cheesy dishes eaten at restaurants. But the country's appetite for cheese also reflects U.S. policy. Since the New Deal, Washington has tried to protect dairy farmers through price 

supports and production controls so arcane that only specialists can understand them. As a 2004 Agriculture leaving Department report explained, the net effect of dairy programs is to prop up fluid milk prices even when producers make more of it than people want to drink — plenty of excess to dump on cheese manufacturers. "Thus, consumers see lower butter and cheese prices and higher fluid milk prices than would appear in the absence of the programs," the USDA found. Not surprisingly, fluid milk consumption has stagnated while cheese consumption has grown. Of the 188.9 billion pounds of milk produced in 2008, some 82 billion were sold to cheese makers, according to the USDA. On top of those warped incentives, the Dairy Production Stabilization Act of 1983 authorized the Agriculture Department to collect a fee from all dairy farmers and turn the money over to a corporation known as Dairy Management, which promotes consumption of cheese and other dairy products".

Cheese and ice cream are two products liked universally and one of the reasons for this phenomenon in a country like the US is the ridiculously low prices at which they are offered in the market. In contrast fluid milk consumption is deliberately depressed by making it much more costlier which has the effect of stagnating consumption by those who find it increasingly difficult to buy it due to escalating prices. The twin objectives of satisfying the farmer as well as the industry are achieved by increased retail prices of milk to the consumer and supply of excess milk production to the dairy processing industry to turn out products like cheese, butter and ice cream at relatively low prices. It is the consumer who is left behind in this convoluted situation as drinking milk is progressively reduced and consumption of high calorie and high fat foods is increased putting the consumer health in jeopardy. This explains the tripling of the population that has become over weight and obese in the last 40 years and to day more than two thirds of American population are categorized as either over weight or obese! It is the unfortunate political compulsions that make the ruling class blind to the dangers of wrong and unhealthy food and environmental degradation due to pollution, global warming and other scientifically proven findings. If the US is facing frequent hot weathers, droughts, floods and similar abnormal situations to day, one must thank its government for the wrong policies being pursued by it. 

V.H.POTTY
http://vhpotty.blogspot.com/
http://foodtechupdates.blogspot.com

THE CALORIE "DISCONNECT"-ALMOND STORY

There is a well ingrained perception that nuts are rich sources of energy as they contain high levels of fat which is logical. Obviously those watching calorie content in their diet will naturally shun these food components as much as possible. Nutrition labeling regulations provide for information including fat content in a product, saturated fat, trans fats and calories derived from them. Most of these data are generated by multiplying the carbohydrate, protein and fat content in a product by the appropriate factors laid down under universally accepted nutrition norms. Thus knowing the proximate composition of a product enables calculation of gross energy supposed to be available to the body. New findings that the entire fat content in some of the tree nuts like Almonds, when consumed, is not absorbed by the body are indeed surprising and will probably be welcomed by diet watchers all over the world. It is interesting to learn about the logic of this new revelation as reported by a  a credible scientific group recently based on laboratory studies. 

Scientists are starting to discover that the standard way of measuring calories, established more than 100 years ago, may not be terribly accurate when it comes to higher fat, high-fiber foods like nuts. But when it comes to almonds, the count may be off by a whole lot. Food scientists at the U.S. Department of Agriculture recently published a new study that finds almonds have about 20 percent fewer calories than previously documented. That's off by a lot more than an earlier British study showing pistachios have about 5 percent fewer calories than we thought, says USDA researcher David Baer, who worked on both studies. "We were surprised," he says. Baer and his colleagues compared the feces (poop, if you prefer) of people eating a controlled diet with almonds to ones who were eating a diet without any nuts. What they found was that "when people are consuming nuts, the amount of fat in the feces goes up," Bear says. "And that suggests that we're not absorbing all the fat or calories that's in the nut." In essence, the fat in the feces shows there's a disconnect between the gross energy found in an almond and the energy our bodies actually absorb.

Why 20% of the fat consumed via Almond is excreted from the GI tract is a matter of conjecture as of now. It is possible that the masticating efficiency in human beings may not be adequate to expose the fat contained in Almond cells to digestive juices which are supposed to hydrolyze it into fatty acids before absorption across the intestine. If this is so the fat absorption factor should be highly variable depending on how any given food is eaten by different individuals. It is true that efficiency of absorption can be high when food is eaten slowly, chewed and masticated thoroughly before swallowing. Especially in the case of oil seed nuts, extraction of fat is indeed a difficult process and the oil seed processing industry employs high pressure presses after breaking the fat cells to get almost 90% of the theoretical oil content. It is the pre-pressing step involving thermal treatment that breaks the fat cells, enabling the mechanical presses to recover the oil efficiently. In the human system fat release is largely dependent on the efficiency of mastication which will determine the amount of fat absorbed eventually across the GI tract. In the light of above findings, calorie content as being declared needs to be confirmed by actual in vivo testing but on the practical side the existing system of calculated calories based on proximate composition, followed universally will still serve the purpose of diet formulations and nutrient labeling.    

V.H.POTTY
http://vhpotty.blogspot.com/
http://foodtechupdates.blogspot.com

  

THE VEGETABLE ANXIETY SYNDROME-A SUMMER PHENOMENON!

Global efforts to make people eat more vegetables are intended to provide a healthy diet offering many micro nutrients and phyto chemicals with proven credentials. According to health experts fruits and vegetables must constitute about 50% of the food on one's dining plate to ensure freedom from frequent ailments and common diseases. Still the growth of consumption of these protective foods is hardly perceptible due to many factors. One of the most intimidating reasons is the relative cost of fruits and vegetables which have become non-affordable to more than three fourth of the global population while even those with adequate disposable income prefer to take calorie rich and fatty foods due to their highly palatable nature. Another important reason is the seasonal nature of fruits and vegetables available mostly during summer and their highly perishable nature. Modern technology does have means to extent the life of these fresh produce which commercial processors deploy in ample measures but when it comes to storage at the home level,most kitchens do not have the wherewithal to capitalize on seasonal gluts and low prices due to limited storage facilities at low temperatures. If pundits are to be believed such a situation, unwittingly leading to considerable wastage of foods at the household level, affects the morale of many housewives who are overwhelmed, becoming literally panicky, by the extent of rotting following the buying spree and subsequent inability to protect them. Here is a take on this new development in consumer attitude and behavior.     

"What should be a beautiful and inspiring sight — your kitchen, overflowing with seasonal produce — is sometimes an intimidating tableau of anxiety. The knobbly piles and dirt-caked bunches are overwhelming. Already the peak-ripe multicolored peppers are developing soft spots; the chard is wilting and the race is on. "People often feel overwhelmed in the kitchen, and when all this produce suddenly arrives, they panic," said Ronna Welsh, a chef in Brooklyn who teaches workshops on, among other topics, produce management. Vegetable anxiety can strike anyone at this time of year: C.S.A. subscribers, compulsive farm-stand stoppers and even vegetarians. "All this produce arrives with a deadline," said Benjamin Elwood, a lawyer in St. Paul. "It's like when a DVD comes from Netflix. You feel like you have to watch the movie ASAP in order to get your money's worth, but the pressure makes you not want to watch it."

Though there are some proven household techniques that can preserve fruits and vegetables for some time, the products do not meet with the expectations of the consumers vis-a-vis fresh produce. Steeping preservation, sugar infusion, canning and bottling, dehydration etc change the texture and eating quality dramatically. In contrast commercial players deploy large scale freezing, modified atmosphere storage and packing, irradiation, cold sterilization etc to get extended periods of storage life. Probably it may be a challenge for food technologists to come up with home scale technologies practicable under situations that prevail in kitchens of middle class families which can achieve a few days extra life with least cost. Recent innovation of a simple paper strip impregnated with some plant extracts capable of increasing the life of perishable foods in the refrigerator could be a boon to house wives all over the world. More such innovations can make the life of middle class families much more comfortable without causing the so called "vegetable anxiety syndrome" .

V.H.POTTY
http://vhpotty.blogspot.com/
http://foodtechupdates.blogspot.com

"MODERN" TOMATO-DOES CONSUMER ACCEPT IT?

Tomato is one of the most consumed vegetables in the world and most consumers associate its quality with color and taste. Of course texture also counts to some extent when tomato is eaten as a part of a salad. But the processing industry wants, above all, a firm texture that will enable shipping over long distances with minimum damage. With the advent of modern biotechnology, it is possible to impart any desirable characteristics to a plant as desired by the consumer or the processor. Modern day retailing system involves hauling food materials over long distance through road, rail, ship and air and naturally such long distance haulage can inflict heavy damage during transportation. During development of firm textured tomato varieties some genetic changes are brought about by the plant breeders to get a uniform color and texture and it appears such genetic tinkering  while imparting the color and texture sought after, also caused flavor changes making modern tomato practically a flavorless vegetable. The good old heirloom tomato with its characteristic juiciness and flavor has been relegated to oblivion and here is the sad story of such a transformation. 

It looks like 70 years of breeding for better color in unripe fruit has inadvertently helped create the wet-paper towel flavor of the modern tomato.  Growers care about the green of unripe tomatoes, explains biochemist Ann L. Thomas Powell of the University of California, Davis. Ripening globes that are each uniformly green let growers easily judge when a field will be ready for harvest. Over decades breeders have selected for this uniform green coloring instead of for tomatoes that turn a deeper shade around the stem end, Powell says. The problem is, getting rid of that dark green zone, called green shoulders, turns out to have sabotaged a gene called SlGLK2 that boosts sugar and other sources of flavor in the ripe tomato, Powell and her colleagues report in the June 29 Science. "It is a good illustration of unintended consequences," says molecular biologist Harry Klee of the University of Florida in Gainesville, who studies tomato flavor. For years, Powell says, breeders assumed that a ripe red tomato got all of its sugars from the little photosynthetic engines known as chloroplasts in the plant leaves. It turns out, however, that a green-shouldered tomato gets about 20 percent of its sugars from its own chloroplasts. Without a functional SlGLK2 gene, the ripening tomato forms fewer and punier chloroplasts that don't deliver, Powell and her colleagues have found.

The million dollar question is whether such gross changes in the original nature of a vegetable like Tomato is accepted readily by the consumer and is there still a yearning for the good old tomato? Probably the modern generation of consumers who were not acquainted with the original Tomato may not be too much bothered by the flavorless characteristics of the product available to day having had no chance to see and experience eating the real Tomato and therefore industry can get away with such brazen attempts to ignore flavor in preference to texture and color. Probably a time may come when there might be a renascence of old Tomato and consumers willing to pay a premium price as it has happened with organic foods.  

V.H.POTTY
http://vhpotty.blogspot.com/
http://foodtechupdates.blogspot.com

NEW "TB" DANGERS-INDIA AND CHINA IN THE SAME BOAT?

Tuberculosis more commonly known as TB or MTB  is a scourge affecting millions of people in poor countries, caused mainly by the bacterium, Mycobacterium tuberculi. Though it is estimated that almost one third of the world population carry this infection with those in poor countries accounting for 80% of the cases but only about 13 million people are chronically affected by TB and the death toll due to this disease is estimated to be about 1.5 million per year. The bacteria affect the lungs and its manifestation is through coughing with bloody sputum, fever, night sweats and weight loss during the active progress of the disease. One of out of every latent carriers of TB progress to chronic stage. TB spreads through air and those who are active carriers can infect others through sneezing, coughing and saliva. As the bacterium has strong outer cell wall, drugs often prove to be ineffective in treating this disease. Though during initial stages single antibiotic may work, multi drug treatment is the only option at later stages. drugs like Rifampicin, Isoniazid, Pyrazinamide, Ethambutol are the choices administered singly or in combinations. Recent reports that TB variants resistant to all known drugs are emerging in China and India are indeed alarming. Here are two such reports which illustrate the dangers posed by such drug resistant TB in these countries.    

Out of the million Chinese who develop TB every year, researchers say at least 110,000 get a form that's resistant to the mainstay drugs isoniazid and rifampin. Patients with such multidrug-resistant or MDR tuberculosis have to be treated for up to two years with expensive second-line drugs that are toxic and less effective. Worse yet, the new survey shows that at least 8,200 Chinese are coming down with extensively resistant or XDR-TB. That means it's also resistant to at least two of the second-line drugs — and thus may be incurable in many cases. And still worse, most of these resistant cases are being passed from patient to patient. So drug-resistant forms of TB are circulating in the community, they're not just being created one patient at a time when an individual doesn't get a full course of the right drugs (although that's happening too). "The results of this nationwide survey in China confirm that the country has a serious epidemic of drug-resistant tuberculosis," write study authors, who mostly work at the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention, a government agency. Writing in the New England Journal of Medicine, the researchers report that a third of new TB cases and half of patients with previously treated TB have drug-resistant forms. "China has the highest annual number of MDR tuberculosis in the world — a quarter of the cases worldwide," the Chinese experts note in a forthright statement that bears no trace of muting the problem for the sake of national pride.

Tuberculosis specialists in India have diagnosed infections in a dozen patients in Mumbai that are unfazed by the three first-choice TB drugs and all nine second-line drugs. The doctors are calling them "totally drug-resistant TB," and the infections are essentially incurable with all available medicines. It's a sobering development. Infectious disease specialists say there will surely be more such cases in India and other countries where cases of TB that resist some but not all drugs are being inadequately treated. Poor care is fueling the development of the super bugs. "The vast majority of these unfortunate patients seek care from private physicians in a desperate attempt to find a cure for their tuberculosis," the Indian specialists write in Clinical Infectious Diseases. "The majority of these prescriptions were inappropriate and would only have served to further amplify resistance." The team did a study that showed only five of 106 private practitioners "wrote the correct prescription for treating TB," Dr. Zarir F Udwadia, one of the study authors, told Daily News and Analysis, an Indian publication. "The other TB challenge is diagnosis, especially of resistant strains, and here again the news is not good," writes infectious disease blogger Maryn McKenna. "The World Health Organization said last spring that only two-thirds of countries with resistant TB epidemics have the lab capacity to detect the resistant strains." Johns Hopkins TB researcher Dr. Richard Chaisson tells Shots that "total resistance is a new phenomenon that is entirely predictable." It's predictable, he says, because hundreds of thousands of people in India have what's called multidrug-resistant TB, or MDR-TB. And a growing number have "extensively resistant TB," or XDR-TB. And very, very few of them are getting the expensive, hard-to-take drugs that might cure their infections. "If you don't provide supervised second-line drugs, this is what you're going to see," agrees Dr. Carol Dukes Hamilton of Duke University. "People go to practitioners who aren't TB experts. They don't give the right doses or make sure people take them." Still, the development of these cases of totally resistant TB doesn't necessarily mean epidemics will sweep through India, or anywhere else, right away. For one thing, there's no evidence so far that patients with these defiant TB strains are transmitting them to others. Most likely, Hamilton says, these patients didn't catch the maximally resistant TB strain from someone else. Rather each patient probably incubated his or her own totally resistant strain after being inadequately treated. That allows the TB bacterium to develop resistance to one drug after another. Technically, the Indian cases might not really be totally resistant. The Mumbai specialists didn't try some so-called third-line experimental drugs that U.S. doctors might use in such cases. At least one of the Mumbai patients did have surgery to remove diseased lung tissue, but she died anyway. But practically speaking, such treatments aren't usually available in India or many other places where totally drug-resistant cases may arise. The problem of evolving TB drug resistance has been brewing for years. In the early 1990s, multidrug-resistant TB began spreading in New York City, abetted by homelessness, prison outbreaks and HIV. Aggressive identification and treatment of these cases, including the direct observation of patients taking their pills, snuffed out that epidemic. In 2005, extensively drug-resistant TB — strains untreatable with the three first-line drugs and several second-choice medications — cropped up in the South African province of Kwazulu-Natal, again abetted by HIV, which devastates immune defenses. Chaisson says South Africa has since mounted an effective program of treatment with the few drugs that work against XDR-TB. "But they have more patients than they have treatment slots," he says. Two Italian women with HIV were the first recognized cases of "totally drug-resistant TB" back in 2003. Another 15 patients with totally resistant infections were discovered in 2009 in Iran. So nobody expects the new Mumbai cases will be the end of this troubling new phenomenon.

BCG vaccination during early childhood was a standard procedure to protect children from TB infection but there is no unanimity regarding the effectiveness of the this preventive measure. Its performance has been erratic besides losing its potency after the age of 10 years. Another potent TB causing bacterium T. bovis has become almost extinct after the advent of milk pasteurization technology that is able to eliminate this species from milk. Other lesser known species like M. africanum, M.canetti and M.microti are not so virulent and wide spread, deserving much attention. How this bacterium has been able to evolve into multi drug resistant version is a matter of speculation. Many TB treatment specialists opine that Multi Drug resistant Tuberculosis develops because of sub-optimal treatment meted out by local physicians helping the bacterium to evolve into resistant versions over a period of time. Both China and India need to gear up their TB monitoring and treatment infrastructure to stop the spread of this scourge on its track immediately.  

V.H.POTTY
http://vhpotty.blogspot.com/
http://foodtechupdates.blogspot.com

   

GM FOODS-THE GREAT LABELING WAR!

Labeling regulations which are in force in many countries have been evolved to provide useful information to consumers regarding the nature of foods sold, its nutritive value, expiration date, price per unit and any others of relevance. The system currently in vogue has served admirably in most cases though there are rumblings from some quarters seeking more information about the foods marketed. The information provided is mostly confined to the products and no one questions the nature of technology used to prepare the foods. One of the exceptions to this rule was made in the case of irradiated foods where some countries insist on declaring irradiation process on the label. The endless campaign to compel the food industry to declare whether a particular food is made through genetic engineering technology or whether the product contains ingredients made by genetic manipulation is running its course in countries like the US where a massive procession was taken out by antagonists of GM foods to the Office of the President of that country demanding compulsory labeling of such foods. This is a very controversial subject with no unanimity regarding the safety of GM foods on a long term basis with opponents and supporters marshaling "evidence" in support of their stand. While the food safety authorities in the US has not changed its stand taken in 1992 that GM products are safe to consume, there are many states which are taking initiatives to force their local governments to impose such labeling restrictions. The State of California, considered one of the most progressive states in the US is considering  compulsory labeling regulations based on a referendum to be carried out soon to seek people's view. If passed by a majority, no food industry can sell any product containing GM food ingredients in that state. It will be interesting to watch the developing situation which will shape the future of GM foods in the US. Here is take on this controversial subject.     

Voters will soon decide whether to make California the first state in the country to require labels on products such as sweet corn whose genes have been altered to make them resistant to pests. Proposition 37 promises to set up a big-money battle pitting natural food businesses and activists against multinational companies including PepsiCo,Coca-Cola and Kellogg. Backers and opponents have already raised nearly $4 million combined for campaigns to sway voters, an amount that's likely to swell into the tens of millions of dollars as the November election approaches. So-called GMO foods — those made from genetically modified organisms — have been declared safe by U.S. regulators. But concern persists about the unforeseen consequences of this laboratory tinkering on human health and the environment. The outcome in California could rattle the entire U.S. food chain. An estimated 70% to 80% of processed foods sold in supermarkets could be affected, industry experts said, along with a variety of fresh fruits and vegetables. The measure qualified for the California ballot with nearly 1 million signatures; labeling in the state could set a precedent that's followed nationwide. "This will be a big fight," said Shaun Bowler, a UC Riverside political scientist specializing in initiatives. "This is a popular issue because people are very afraid of the words 'genetically engineered.' And the people who sell this stuff are worried about losing sales." Backers of the initiative are encouraged by a pair of recent national opinion surveys showing that about 9 out of 10 consumers support labeling. A California-specific poll, released Thursday by the Business Roundtable and the Pepperdine University School of Public Policy, showed Proposition 37 has an almost 3-to-1 ratio of support, with 64.9% of prospective voters favoring it, compared with 23.9% opposed. 

Why the US alone is resisting this labeling demand is some what unclear though strong lobbying by GM food giants with billions of dollars at stake may be behind this anachronism. Over 50 countries have compulsory labeling rule for GM foods and nothing untoward has happened during the last few years such restrictions were in force. The fact that GM food labeling controversy has become a political foot ball match between the States and the Federal Government is making the situation more dicey. It is not clear how similar propositions to label GM foods never got majority support in some 20 states where balloting had taken place during the last few years. Whether California balloting will break with the past remains to be seen but if pre-referendum polls of overwhelming support from the people, are to be believed, food industry in the US will have to work out a different strategy to market their food products in that state since  almost 80% of foods in that country are based on GM ingredients.

V.H.POTTY
http://vhpotty.blogspot.com/
http://foodtechupdates.blogspot.com

EATING AND THE HUMAN BRAIN-ANOTHER EXCUSE FOR UNDISCIPLINED EATING?

Here is a theory that floats the idea that every human being has a definitive "reservoir" of self control which can be exhausted if too much effort is made to repeatedly control eating tendencies vis-a-vis highly palatable foods like sweets and other cravings. How far this theory is supported by scientific evidence is some thing subject to interpretation of some MRS scanning studies carried out by psychologists. Here is a gist of the report published in a reputed periodical that reveals the complex working of human brain when it comes to deciding about the food that is to be eaten.   

"Ever wonder why you worked so hard to avoid the lasagna at dinner only to give in to your craving for not one but two helpings of cake for dessert? Well, new research may hold some answers to this vexing question. A new study in the Journal of Consumer Psychology confirms what we've been - what we've known for some time, and that is each of us has an internal reservoir of self-control. We have a reservoir of self-control that it depletes. Every time we resist a temptation, we use a little bit of it up. But for the first time, researchers have taken pictures of the brain to show what was happening when a person exerts and then loses self-control. Dr. William Hedgcock was a co-author of the study. He is a neuroscientist and assistant professor of marketing at the University of Iowa. He joins us from Denver".

The views expressed by the scientists need further elaboration and unless there are concrete  data that support the basis of the above findings, using it for modifying human response to foods cannot be accomplished. If there are some ways human brain can be influenced it should be possible to evoke responses that will enable exercise of more self control on food choices. It is true that temptation to gorge sugar rich foods and high fat products is too difficult to control and in spite of enormous data accumulating over the yeas about the ill effects of over consumption of foods, especially calorie rich products, a substantial segment of the population find it impossible to curb consumption probably due to the fast depletion of their "internal reservoir of self control" in an environment of abundance of rich foods. The result is there for all to see in the form of rampant obesity all around. It is possible that these findings may support the efforts of social activists to restrain the food industry from flooding the market with unhealthy foods that stimulate the palate and provide an environment that does not seriously challenge the self control reservoir embedded in the brains of each individual.  

V.H.POTTY
http://vhpotty.blogspot.com/
http://foodtechupdates.blogspot.com