Call To Ban Chocolate In Push To Reduce Childhood Obesity

A new focus on reducing childhood obesity would see a ban on fundraising chocolate sold in schools and advertising for junk food eliminated during shows such as Junior Masterchef.

The Obesity Policy Coalition has released a national strategy to address advertising of junk food to children, backed by the Cancer Council Australia, Diabetes Australia, the National Heart Foundation and the Australian Medical Association.

The blueprint recommends removing television advertising of junk food from 6am to 9am and 4pm to 9pm during the week and from 6am to noon and 4pm to 9pm at the weekend. Similar time frames are advised for cable television and children’s websites.

In a push that might see the school Easter egg raffle go the way of hatless kids in the playground, the blueprint also supports banning marketing poor food choices to children via school fund-raising drives, text messages, sporting games, email, movies, magazines, billboards and public transport advertising.

According to recent research by the Cancer Council, 84 per cent of adults surveyed by telephone believed junk food advertising to children should be curtailed, answering "yes" to "Do you believe children should be protected from unhealthy food advertising?"

The Obesity Coalition’s Jane Martin says ads for unhealthy food appeared during Junior MasterChef, Modern Family and The Simpsons, which are the highest-rating programs for 5-12-year-old children.
"It just makes me think that advertisers and marketers know exactly what they are doing; they know how and when to reach [children] in large numbers," Martin says.

Kate Carnell, the chief executive of the Australian Food and Grocery Council, says a similar ban in Sweden and in Quebec, Canada, did not garner the desired result. "It has made absolutely no difference to obesity levels in children," she said.

Instead, the Food and Grocery Council has decided not to spruik junk food in shows watched by children alone, but will do so within family shows, such as Junior Masterchef as they say parents can then advise their children on sensible eating.

"When families are watching together then they can make a decision on how often those foods should be part of a diet," Carnell says.

However, self-regulation by the junk food industry is not successful, says Boyd Swinburn from the World Health Organisation's collaborating centre for obesity prevention at Deakin University, as food companies have multi-million dollar budgets to counteract and "undermine the healthy eating campaigns from NGOs and health promotion organisations".

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