Milling News
The Raghavan Report Food myths & celebrities: Impacts on the food industry and consumers’ health by Raghavan (‘Ragha’) Sampathkumar Every year, the second Friday of October is celebrated as “World Egg Day”. On this day, it is important, as industry stakeholders of the food industry, to ensure spreading truthful information about the nutritional superiority of eggs and concerted action from all stakeholders for busting myths about food, in general. Let us first take eggs as nutritional food. Eggs are one of the nature’s powerful foods packed with essential nutrients such as proteins, vitamins and minerals that are better in quality and bioavailability than most of the comparable foods. For example, eggs contain choline, an essential nutrient that helps brain development and cognitive abilities in children. Similarly, the protein in egg white is possibly the best quality protein with a biological value (BV) of a perfect 100, more than all others. However, since last few years, several reports about linking eggs to various kinds of illness including cardio-vascular diseases, bad cholesterol etc have been spread on several social media channels. An ordinary consumer, who might or might not have clear understanding of science and nutrition, will be made to believe whatever posted on social media as truthful information. However, after certain point and getting overloaded with information, the consumer gives up and does not think much further rationally. Ultimately, the purpose of such misinformation i.e. to confuse the consumers is achieved. However, this has huge negative implications on food industry and also the consumers. Truth does not travel as fast as lies. But due to fears spread based on unknown and unfounded claims, the food industry suffers loss of reputation and it is nearly impossible to counter the negative publicity with the limited resources that the industry has. All these negatively impact the way consumers decide about what food to consume and 22 | November 2018 - Milling and Grain
influences their preferences. Added to this are celebrities showcasing their latest ‘food fads’ on social media, which influences a huge number of people particularly, youth across the world. This trend is unfortunately growing as people blindly follow the celebrities without considering their situation in terms of socio-economic status, country’s development and also future generations. Today’s youth have much greater opportunities to seek information but that must be authentic and reliable. When in doubt, who should be consulted? A celebrity or an expert? Hence, I urge today’s young generation not to blindly believe in the celebrity endorsements and/or shifting their preference to different kinds of diets. When in doubt, they should rather consult a nutritionist to get the correct information. Food fads are not new but with the advent of social media, their reach and impact have grown multi-fold. It is visible from the way diets across the world are converging and the world’s dependence for calories has increased on a few crops in the last four or five decades. As a result, a significant number of indigenous crops that once used to be major food, have almost disappeared from the menu. Hence, the food industry in Asia must act now to improve its reach and educate consumers about food and nutrition. It is no longer a discussion of cost of doing business. It is actually “cost of losing” business. Further all the stakeholders connected with food, health and nutrition domains, must come forward to bust the myths starting from their family level. Regulators, on the other hand, need to take stern action against those who are making false claims and spreading unfounded myths. Policy makers must take a holistic view about the interplay of different sectors – agriculture, human medicine, veterinary sciences, etc. But ultimately if every consumer starts asking the right questions - “Is it true?”, “Should I really follow a celebrity for advice on food?” – the entire society stands to benefit.