PHM-Exch> Article: India is Not a 'VegetarianCountry' Like the EAT-Lancet Report Would Have Us Believe (contd)
Alison Linnecar
alinnecar at gmail.com
Fri Dec 20 06:00:02 PST 2019
Dear Claudio and PHM,
Thank you for all these exchanges. As a pumpkin (and tomato) grower I am
most interested in the variety of locally produced foods, so many of which
are being displaced by imported plastic-wrapped packages of commercial
snack foods. The waste created is phenomenal.
So I am taking this opportunity to share the latest Green Feeding
documents, including the flyer produced with Extinction Rebellion/XR in the
UK. XR is not only about people glueing themselves to trains or other
people such as politicians. In the UK it is also a series of professional
hubs such as the Doctors' Hub. The lactation consultants and mother support
group members in this hub produced the Green Feeding flyer, with
suggestions for action in the UK, which IBFAN-GIFA then adapted for action
internationally.
Our message is Start Right for climate action from birth. We need to
promote Green Feeding right from the start for healthier babies, healthier
mothers and a healthier planet.
Green Feeding from the start concerns infants and young children from 0 to
36 months, and sets the pattern for avoiding ultra-processed and
ultra-promoted industrial products, and instead for eating food produced
locally by sustainable agriculture. Green Feeding goes beyond infant
formula and includes formulas for older babies and commercial complementary
foods.
But this is a huge challenge because, as shown by the report by Save the
Children in the UK , for every baby born in this world, the baby milk and
food companies spend UK£36 or 42 Euros on advertising:
https://www.savethechildren.org.uk/news/media-centre/press-releases/leading-milk-formula-companies-spend-p36-on-marketing-for-every-
In this way these companies have also created a huge and expanding market
for products for the age group after infant formula: these Follow-up milks,
FUMs, and Growing-up Milks, GUMS, have the greatest advertising
expenditure:
https://www.statista.com/statistics/917797/baby-milk-brands-by-ad-spend-united-kingdom-uk/
Yet the World Health Organization has deemed them as 'not necessary and
unsuitable'. Moreover, research shows that these products have the largest
carbon footprints as well as heavy water footprints.
The updated Green Feeding documents are here and the list includes the link
to the British Medical Journal Editorial "Support for breastfeeding is an
environmental imperative":
- *New *Extinction Rebellion flyer on Breastfeeding – Green Feeding
<https://www.gifa.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/12/xr_breastfeeding_A5_4_pages_international_2019.pdf>
in English (Dec 2, 2019)
- *Revised* Green Feeding Trailer
<https://www.gifa.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/2019-Green-Feeding-Trailer-Nov-18th.pdf>,
in English, 2 pages (Nov 18, 2019)
- Green Feeding Europe and Worldwide 2019
<https://www.gifa.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/12/2019-Green-Feeding-Europe-Worldwide-Dec2.pdf>
in English, 21 pages (Dec 2, 2019)
- Green Feeding Key messages
<https://www.gifa.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/12/2019-Green-Feeding-Key-Messages-Dec2.pdf>
2019 in English, 2 pages (Dec 2, 2019)
- Green Feeding References and Resources 2019
<https://www.gifa.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/12/2019-Green-Feeding-References-and-Resources-Dec.pdf>,
5 pages (Dec 2, 2019)
- Green Feeding Canada
<https://www.gifa.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/2019-Green-Feeding-Canada-June.pdf>
in English, 10 pages (June 20, 2019)
- Green Feeding Messages Clés 2019
<https://www.gifa.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/2019-Green-Feeding-Key-messages-FRENCH-16oct2019.pdf>
en français, 2 pages (16 oct 2019)
- Support for breastfeeding is an environmental imperative
<https://www.bmj.com/content/367/bmj.l5646> Joffe N et al, BMJ 2 October
2019
Wishing you all happy and healthy eating over the festive period!
Best regards,
Alison
Alison Linnecar
Convenor, IBFAN global working group on chemical and microbiological
contamination of infant feeding products and Green Feeding - action on
climate change <https://www.gifa.org/international/green-feeding/>
On Thu, 19 Dec 2019 at 08:55, Claudio Schuftan <cschuftan at phmovement.org>
wrote:
> From: eva.maintz at gmail.com
>
>
>
> Thank you very much for sharing your thoughts about the lancet EAT-Report.
>
> I am currently working in a working group for sustainable food in germany
>
> and we are discussing EAT very intensively. I think it is a important and
>
> very useful paper in a lot of sences but with several weak and criticable
>
> points as yiu already mentiined. Our main concern from a geman perspective
>
> is the influence of the food industry as the health concerns of highly
>
> processed foods are not mentioned in a single sentence and the allowed
>
> amount of sugar ( which has the highest evidence of being unhealthy food)
>
> is quite high.
>
> Richa, could you share the references you mentioned in your email?
>
>
>
> Thanks a lot and greetings from germany
>
>
>
> Eva
>
> Xxx
>
> From Radha Holla holla.radha at gmail.com
>
>
>
> I do agree with you, Kaaren, that a plant based diet may reduce the impact
> of farming on the climate. However, not all plant based agriculture does
> so. The cattle farms will be replaced by grain producing industrial farms
> with the continued heavy use of chemicals. Secondly no where does the EAT
> Lance report stress on the diversity-based farming systems of many
> indigenous and poor communities across the world, which have little effect
> on climate change, but rather mitigate it. This diversity based agriculture
> includes not just mixed cropping, but also the use of animals for manure,
> for energy and for food both as milk and meat. The animals and poultry
> forage rather than being fed in feedlots. There are also studies that the
> meat of foraging goats has lower effects on cholesterol than even chicken
> or other white meat. One of the most damaging statements in the EAT Lancet
> report is on achieving balance in use of nutrients - reduce the use of
> chemicals in countries where industrial agriculture is practised, but
> increase them where it is not. This seems to imply that diversity-based
> farming should start using more chemicals. How is this going to help
> climate change.
>
>
>
> To me, what seems to be the thrust is to promote organic food only as a
> niche product, which it is in most countries already, and further trade by
> treating locally nutrient rich sources of food as unsuitable and needing to
> be replaced by highly priced organic foods, including imported food. The
> millets, which are a wonderful answer to climate change, are being
> increasingly replaced in middle class families by foods such as quinoa,
> which is a good food, but needs to be imported. Foods like amaranth leaves,
> chenopodium leaves, beet leaves, colocasia leaves, etc. are hardly
> available in the market except a few local markets, but spinach, broccoli,
> orange carrots, brussels sprouts are all available. Why not pumpkin instead
> of orange carrots in summer? The range of ingredients identified by the Eat
> Lancet report does not take into consideration the nutritive value of local
> products like coconut oil, sesame oil, peanut oil, but is only focusing on
> improving usage of olive oil, which again needs to be imported. Advertising
> with its beautiful colourful pics of imported fruits and vegetables adds to
> this. There is no mention of the need to promote local production for local
> consumption, to reduce the stress on land and water, to consume what the
> season gives in abundance, to vary the diet to include all foods - plants,
> grains, fruits (not just apples and pears), eggs, milk and meat in a
> balance that does not negatively impact climate change while at the same
> time, improves health and nutrition.
>
> Xxxx
>
>
>
> From: Sam Lanfranco lanfran at yorku.ca
>
>
>
> I think it is important to understand how the EAT Lancet article went
>
> wrong, and how it is being dealt with wrongly, as opposed to what it got
>
> wrong, or right. Food is essential to survival, not just to health. Also,
>
> every part of the human food ecosystem (production, processing,
>
> consumption, waste) links to other crucial issues such as global warming,
>
> chemical pollution, food waste, and waste disposal, through to issues of
>
> small scale farming income and gender employment (e.g. most African food
>
> crops for local consumption are tended to by women).
>
>
>
> One would think that being essential to survival and health,
> and the
>
> impact on bigger natural and social ecosystem issues, would make
>
> understanding the food ecosystem a high priority. Instead the food
>
> ecosystem has been mainly a battle ground of special interests, special
>
> interests ranging from the massive multinational food corporations where
>
> the oligopolies in production, processing and distribution have inordinate
>
> market and political power, to those pushing one diet or another. This is
>
> frequently done irrespective of the local context, and without stakeholder
>
> participation in the dialogues whose policies will affect them directly.
>
>
>
> As a development economist and farmer who has worked with
> Indian
>
> colleagues for decades the Lancet article reads, to me, as though the
>
> writers had been seduced by a blend of smooth talking self-interest South
>
> Asian charm on the part of their hosts, combined with a limited
>
> understanding of the local context in terms of the links between food
>
> practices, health, family income and wider environmental concerns.
>
>
>
> In my view what the article should prompt is a deeper
> understanding of the
>
> importance of engaging all of the stakeholders in discussions around (a)
>
> what are the lessons to be learned from the food ecosystem, here for both
>
> Indian best practices and for Indian problems (e.g. water, poverty) and (b)
>
> what are the knowledge translation and practice opportunities afforded by
>
> contacts across different food ecosystems. To use the article to push one
>
> dietary solution or another does a disservice to both ourselves and to the
>
> health of the planet, a planet whose health we rely on.
>
>
>
>
>
>
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