Four major food firms join to alter industry policy
A year after the United States’ powerful food lobby began to implode, four of the world’s largest food companies are launching an association of their own.
The Sustainable Food Policy Alliance, unveiled Thursday by the U.S. divisions of Danone, Mars, Nestle and Unilever, says it will fight for progressive food policies — including conservation programs and prominent nutrition labels — that have long been eschewed by major food makers.
In doing so, the new alliance is likely to tangle with the mighty and well-moneyed Grocery Manufacturers Assn., which Mars, Nestle, Unilever and seven other major firms abandoned amid high-profile philosophical disagreements in 2017.
But with combined annual revenue of more than $200 billion, the four companies in the new alliance — responsible for such brands as Dannon yogurt and Snickers candy bars — could prompt other food makers to pay more attention to nutrition and sustainability.
Analysts say it’s evidence of changing consumer tastes’ effect on the global food business.
“We truly believe consumers want this, and they vote with every purchase,” said Mariano Lozano, chief of Danone North America. “We are reaching a moment when what makes business sense and what is the right thing to do come together.”
The alliance will lobby in five policy areas it says are of interest to modern consumers: product transparency, nutrition, the environment, food safety and a positive workplace for food and agriculture workers. The companies say they have coordinated on these issues in the past, and view the formalized alliance as a means to more aggressively petition lawmakers and regulators.
The group also has lobbied farm bill lawmakers to streamline the application process for a popular farm conservation program, and says it will fight for water quality and soil health projects, renewable energy initiatives, and emission-reduction efforts, including the Paris climate accord.
Such positions aren’t merely good public relations, experts say: They’re also good business. The nation’s top processed food companies lost 4% of their market share between 2011 and 2016, according to the Dutch firm Rabobank.
Consumers have increasingly turned to products they believe are more healthful or produced in more sustainable ways, said Marion Nestle, a New York University professor who studies the food industry. And embracing those goals may also help Nestle, Mars, Unilever and Danone differentiate themselves from other large food companies.
“It’s a positive sign that four of the largest food companies in the U.S. recognize we need a new way forward,” said Michele Simon, executive director of the PlantBased Food Assn. and a former public health lawyer. “I think it’s responsive to the shift in consumer interests in a way the old guard of Big Food hasn’t been.”