A Beef Over Ads On Report Card Covers

ORLANDO, Fla., Dec. 6, 2007

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(AP) An Orlando parent said she was appalled when her 9-year-old daughter brought home her report card cover and it contained an advertisement for McDonald’s promising free Happy Meals for good grades, attendance and behavior.Her complaint prompted the Boston-based child advocacy group, Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood to demand Wednesday that McDonald’s immediately stop the report card advertising in the Seminole County School District.

“The promotion takes in-school marketing to a new low,” said Susan Linn, the co-founder and director of the campaign, who said she had not contacted the restaurant chain or the school district. The group issued its demands in a news release. (more…)

If It’s Fresh and Local, Is It Always Greener?

By ANDREW MARTIN

I’VE been feeling pretty smug lately about zipping over to the farmers’ market or the local Whole Foods for some New York apples or New Jersey spinach and ferrying it home in my reusable grocery bags.

Take that, petrochemical cabal!

I’m not the only one feeling so righteous. Unless you have been stuck in the processed-food aisles of your local grocery store for the last couple of years, you have probably noticed that local food is all the rage.

Union Square in Manhattan may offer one of the most popular farmers’ markets, but Des Moines isn’t far behind, and top restaurants and college campuses are now demanding local food on the plate. (more…)

Food-for-grades prize criticized

Complaint prompts McDonald’s inquiry

By Mike Hughlett

Tribune staff reporter
December 7, 2007

In Orlando, good grades can bag elementary students a free McDonald’s Happy Meal; in fact, the tasty incentive is promised on their report card envelopes.

But the food-for-A’s program has caused a tempest this week, another twist in the fight over marketing food and drinks to children. That fight has been gaining steam as child obesity worries have grown, and as advocacy groups have pushed for legislative curbs on ads aimed at kids.

Earlier this year, about a dozen big American food companies, including Oak Brook-based McDonald’s Corp. and Northfield-based Kraft Foods Inc., voluntarily agreed to change their child marketing practices.

As part of the pact, made with the Council of Better Business Bureau, the companies specifically pledged that ads geared toward children under 12 would meet certain nutritional guidelines. (more…)

Web address: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/12/071206161421.htm

Kids Eat More Fruits, Vegetables When Schools Offer Salad Bar

ScienceDaily (Dec. 7, 2007) — A new UCLA study has found that elementary schools can significantly increase the frequency of fruit and vegetable consumption among low-income students by providing a lunch salad bar.

The findings show that the frequency of students’ fruit and vegetable consumption increased significantly — from 2.97 to 4.09 times daily — after a salad bar was introduced. In addition, students’ mean daily intake of energy, cholesterol, saturated fat and total fat declined considerably.

“One of the major contributing factors to the high rate of overweight children in the United States is that they do not consume the daily recommended servings of fruits and vegetables,” said lead author Dr. Wendy Slusser, assistant professor of pediatrics at Mattel Children’s Hospital UCLA and the UCLA School of Public Health. “Increasing the availability and accessibility to healthy foods is one way to improve children’s diets. In turn, this sets up opportunities for kids to have repeated exposure to healthy food and positively impact their choices.” (more…)

McDonald’s and Children’s Health: The Production of New Customers

In a recent study published in the Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine, 1 researchers found that low income 3 to 5 year old children preferred the taste of hamburgers, chicken, French fries, carrots or low fat milk if they thought the products were from McDonald’s, whether or not they actually were. Thus, in their first years of life, children had come to associate McDonald’s brandi! ng with desirable foods, creating a lifetime potential for obesity and over consumption of the high fat, low nutrient products that McDonald’s features. To understand its success in imprinting even the youngest children, Corporations and Health Watch investigated the range of McDonald’s activities geared towards children. By focusing on the specific ways that one company goes about reaching children, we hope to gain insights that can guide public health strategies to reduce childhood obesity.
According to its 2006 Annual Report, McDonald’s is the leading global foodservice retailer with more than 30,000 local restaurants serving 52 million people in more than 100 countries each day. Its 2006 revenues were $ 21.6 billion, up 16% from 2004. (more…)