To start with, food companies are focusing now more than ever on creating compelling packaging and in-store marketing. In 2006, food companies spent $195 million, or 12 percent of their total marketing outlay, to target consumers in-store, where 89 percent of the products they were advertising contain high levels of sugar, sodium, and/or saturated fat.
首先,食品公司越來越重視吸引眼球的食品包裝和店內營銷。2006年,食品公司花費了1億9千5百萬美金相當于12%的營銷支出在店內營銷上,推廣的食品中89%含有高水平的糖份、納和飽和脂肪。
In-store and packaging-based promotion includes everything from putting athletes on boxes to sweepstakes, and from in-box prizes to products that boast philanthropic donations with every purchase. Although there has been some self-regulation within the industry, it has applied more extensively to television advertising than packaging. (Remember how long General Mill’s self-imposed "Smart Labeling" program lasted? Less than three months!)
店內營銷和立足于產品包裝的推廣方式包括把運動員的形象印在包裝上到一些比賽,包裝內附送獎品到將單次購買捆綁與捐贈捆綁。盡管有著相關的規管條例,但其主要應用在了電視廣告上而非包裝上。(記得通用磨坊的“智能標簽”么?只推出三個月就被迫叫停了!)
Second of all, packaging is designed to keep parents from looking at the nutritional label. By cherry-picking nutritional (and more likely pseudo-nutritional) information available in huge lettering on the front of colorful boxes, food companies aim to appease any health or allergen concerns parents might have. But "Great source of calcium!", "No Trans Fat!", and "Gluten Free!" are weak stand-ins for the full nutritional picture.
其次,包裝被設計成了防止父母查看營養標簽的形式。通過在彩色包裝的正面用巨大的字體顯示精心編寫的營養信息(極有可能是假的),食品公司企圖緩和父母們可能存在的對健康和過敏問題的擔憂。但“富含鈣質!”,“不含反式脂肪!”,以及“不含谷蛋白!”根本不能取代完整的營養信息。
And finally, almost all nutrition labels on food targeted at children use the recommended daily intake values for an adult who consumes 2,000 calories a day. This happens even on food for toddlers, who need just HALF the calories of adults, according to the American Heart Association.
最后,幾乎所有針對兒童的食品營養標簽都使用了成人的推薦每日攝入量,后者每日消耗的能量是2000卡。甚至在針對幼兒的食品標簽上也出現了同樣情況,而幼兒每日所需熱量只是成人的一半(據美國心臟學會)。
The result is that all of the percentage daily values on the nutrition labels are completely skewed. While a cup of cereal will have the same 26 grams of carbohydrates regardless of who is eating it, that will account for 9 percent of the recommended daily intake of carbohydrates for adults and 18 percent for a two-year-old. So even if parents' eyes do make it as far as the nutrition label, there is another chance to be misled.
結果是所有營養標簽上的每日所需營養百分比都被扭曲了。不論食用者是誰,一杯麥片含有相同的26克碳水化合物,這能滿足成人每日碳水化合物推薦攝入量的9%及2歲兒童每日碳水化合物推薦攝入量的18%。因此,即使父母們的火眼金睛會看下營養標簽,也都可能被誤導。