BAN JUNK FOOD ADS AIMED AT OUR KIDS

Irish Heart Foundation calls for brave and bold legislation to head off obesity crisis

A COMPLETE ban on junk food advertisers targeting children is needed to avoid an obesity catastrophe, a leading health organisation has warned.

The Irish Health Foundation has complained that a volun- tary code announced nine months ago regulating the promotion of junk food online has still not been finalised, while a TV ban

introduced five years ago on adverts before the 6pm watershed and where children are 50% of the audience is ineffective.

It says these weaknesses mean that children still see more than 1,000 junk food and drink adverts a year on television alone – as well as countless more online.

The warning comes as a report by the Economic and Social Research Institute (ESRI) today finds that 17% of more than 7,500 nine-year-olds studied are overweight, while 5% are obese.

It also discovered that only a quarter of nine-year-olds say they are physically active for at least 60 minutes every single day.

The Irish Heart Foundation said a survey it carried out revealed 79% of adults believe advertising is a very big or fairly big contributor to childhood obesity, while 71% now want an outright ban on junk food advertising and promotion.

CEO Tim Collins said: ‘Young children aged between three and five are still seeing 1,000 adverts a year on TV.

‘Meanwhile, a weak voluntary code failed to prevent an explosion on digital marketing that is more personal and more effective and therefore potentially more damaging. That is not good enough.

‘Evidence of something catastrophic is already emerging. We now have children as young as eight presenting with high blood pressure and young people showing the early signs of heart disease that we once only saw in middleaged people.

‘The biggest marketing brains are relentlessly targeting children who are more susceptible to advertising literally every single day.

‘They have achieved a wholly inappropriate proximity to children.’

Mr Collins said the rise of smartphones allows junkfood advertisers to target children much more extensively than before.

‘Pestering them at home, in school and even in their bedrooms through their smartphones – a brand in the hand as it is called,’ he added. ‘We know the food marketing fuels obesity, is rampant and damages children’s health. They are powerless to resist and we know the public want action.’

Adverts for unhealthy food and drink on television were banned five years ago before 6pm and where the audience is 50% children.

But this is not good enough, according to the IHF which points to a Cancer Research UK report which revealed that the period up to 6pm applies only to 27% of children’s viewing time. Mr Collins said: ‘We make the mistake of thinking that multinational food brands are operating on some kind of ethical basis. They are not. ‘The only ethics are about profit and their managers of marketing are completely numbers-driven,’ said Mr Collins. ‘There are a hundred things we need to do to tackle childhood obesity. There is no point in doing any of them if children are still being bombarded by marketing.’

Dan Parker, founder of the UKbased Living Loud group of health and digital professionals, said junk food marketers are going to extraordinary lengths to influence food choices with potentially serious consequences for children’s long-term health.

‘Junk food advertising has become a monster, manipulating young people’s emotions and their choices,’ he said. ‘Thanks to the explosion of digital marketing on top of loopholes in broadcast regulations being ruthlessly exploited by junk brands, children are being bombarded daily in a way that is impossible to resist. But there should be no circumstances where junk food marketing directed at children is acceptable.’

Advertisers are cleverly getting their branding into online material in ways that are immediately obvious as advertising. This could involve people wearing branded clothing or drinking and eating certain brands.

Mr Parker added: ‘Advertisers are dripping brands into games in a way none of us see our kids are exposed to.’

A Department of Health spokeswoman last night rejected the Irish Heart Foundation’s criticisms. She said: ‘The Codes of Practice concerned were published in February. In line with the Principles of Governance specified in the Codes of Practice, work on the development of the monitoring function for the codes is well underway and we

‘Children see 1,000 ads a year on TV’ ‘The only ethics are about profit’

expect that it shall be well advanced over the next few months. The development of guidance on the codes is also featuring in this process.’

Campaigners will be hoping to replicate the success of Ireland’s smoking ban, which had a major influence around the world.

In March 2004, Ireland became the first country in the world to ban smoking in work places, including pubs. On March 29, the ban went ahead, despite furious objections from the drinks industry.

However, it was a resounding success – cigarette sales fell by 60% in bars and 7,000 people gave up smoking in the first 12 months after the ban came into effect.

The change was not without its losses – pub owners claimed a 25% drop in drink sales within six months.

But for many smokers, it was their path to freedom from the addiction and surveys showed people enjoyed not smelling of smoke after a night out.

A recent Government study suggested that 4,000 lives had been saved by the ban and that thousands have stopped smoking.

ONE in six nine-year-old children is overweight, and one in 20 is obese: staggering figures revealed by the Economic and Social Research Institute that highlight the crisis facing the young in an age when they take less exercise and eat more food full of empty calories.

Nutrition should be one of the key messages we teach our children, but instead we remain passive about it. At the same time, children are relentlessly targeted by companies advertising highsugar or high-carbohydrate foods with little health value.

Yesterday, former advertising executive Dan Parker told a conference in Dublin that junk food marketing is irresponsible and dangerous, and it is hard to disagree. Five years ago, we banned it during programmes shown before 6pm that appealed to younger audiences, but research shows that three-quarters of children are still exposed to such ads between 6pm and 9pm.

At the conference, the Irish Heart Foundation launched a campaign to have junk food advertising banned completely. Many, especially the fast food and soft drinks manufacturers, will howl, but it is a logical move. After all, we heard the same from the tobacco companies about the smoking ban, but the government of the day held its nerve and subsequently introduced plain packaging and a ban of visibility in shops. The result, in a straw poll taken among the younger staff in our office, is that few under 30 smoke at all, and one of our reporters genuinely could not name a single cigarette brand because she had never seen one advertised.

These measures were bold and effective, and the same zeal must now be brought to banning ads for junk food, excessive consumption of which can lead to the same cardiovascular and cancer problems that made a ban on the marketing of tobacco so necessary. For make no mistake – if we allow children to become obese at nine years of age, they will face massive health problems later in life. The time to act is long overdue.