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EnlightenedOsote's blog: "NEWS"

created on 01/22/2008  |  http://fubar.com/news/b180730

Filed Under Food Toxins, Future of Food 

Corn Refiners Fight Back as Kraft, Pepsi Tout Revamped Products

no-hfcsCHICAGO (AdAge.com) — First it was fat, then it was trans fat, and now it’s corn syrup.   Kraft Foods has reformulated a handful of its most popular products in recent years, removing high-fructose corn syrup from Bulls-Eye barbecue sauce, Capri Sun Juice drinks with 25% less sugar, and the majority of its Kraft Salad Dressings line. The company is launching a campaign for Wheat Thins next week, from agency Draft FCB, Chicago. Kraft has reformulated the crackers, more than doubling their whole-grain content, and getting rid of HFCS. 

“We saw some consumers were interested in products without high-fructose corn syrup, so we decided as part of this quality improvement to eliminate [it],” said Kraft spokesman Basil Maglaris. He added that Kraft isn’t out to eliminate HFCS across the board. Marquee products such as Oreos, of course, still contain the sweetener.

Some beverage companies are also promoting their lack of HFCS. PepsiCo launched “throwback” versions of Pepsi and Mountain Dew, which are essentially HFCS-free formulations in retro cans. The products proved successful, leading the company to bring them back for another eight-week run, beginning Dec. 28. A third product, Pepsi Natural, launched this spring and is being positioned as a premium cola. Snapple, meanwhile, went a step further, revamping its entire line of premium juices and teas to eliminate HFCS.

CRA getting message out
Retailers are also climbing onboard the anti-corn bandwagon. Costco has been selling Mexican-made Coca-Cola in some markets, sweetened with sugar rather than syrup, apparently to rave reviews. Costco did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Starbucks removed HFCS and trans fat from products in its bakery case this summer.

But the Corn Refiners Association is fighting back. Its campaign, from agency DDB, Chicago, depicts people such as mothers in a kitchen, or a young couple on a picnic blanket, talking about whether corn sweeteners are bad for you. “It has the same amount of calories as sugar, honey, and it’s fine in moderation,” a woman says while handing her boyfriend a popsicle stick.

“It has really been a nationwide multimedia and advertising campaign targeted principally at moms, given the role they play in buying food,” Corn Refiners Association President Audrae Erickson said of her group’s effort. The association does an all-cable TV buy, focusing on female- and family-oriented networks, such as Lifetime, Bravo, TLC and the Food Network.

According to TNS Media Intelligence, the Corn Refiners Association spent $12 million in measured media during the first half of 2009. Ms. Erickson declined to give the campaign’s budget, but described it as “similar to that of a consumer-package-goods company.”

The organization has also orchestrated a massive public-relations campaign through PR agency Weber Shandwick, also in Chicago. The team is reaching out to mommy bloggers to correct the impression that refined sugar is healthier than HFCS. Ms. Erickson said this effort has been different than the usual mommy-blogger outreach. Massive sampling in search of reviews, for instance, “wouldn’t be appropriate,” she said. It’s all part of a “rapid response” function that also contacts media covering the industry, particularly if they describe a reformulation that removes HFCS as a “healthful” transformation.

Missing the point?
The association has also targeted “thought leaders” such as dieticians and physicians, possibly leading to statements from the American Medical Association and the American Dietetic Association that high-fructose corn syrup is about the same as refined sugar. Ms. Erickson, a former USDA economist, said that the current consumer backlash hasn’t affected the corn refiners’ wallets yet. Consumers’ shift to bottled water and diet sodas from full-calorie colas over the last decade has left the category flat to slightly down in recent years. But current sentiment did spark the campaign. Books such Michael Pollan’s “Omnivore’s Dilemma” got many consumers thinking about corn consumption for the first time.

Still, some advocates think they’re missing the point.

“I don’t know whether it’s laughable or tragic that the corn refiners association is likening its product to sugar,” Rory Freedman, co-author of “Skinny Bitch,” wrote in an e-mail. “Neither HFCS or refined sugar is good for us. Our bodies simply do not like foods that have been highly processed, especially those which cause spikes in our blood-sugar levels.”

Michelle Simon, author of “Appetite for Profit,” said that the product is also much cheaper than sugar, and it has encouraged people to eat and drink more. “It’s the reason why it’s only 10 cents more for a large soda,” she said.

http://adage.com/article?article_id=138583

BEIJING: China has for the first time overtaken the United States as the world's largest auto market with sales of locally-made vehicles surging

17.7 per cent to 6.1 million units in the first six months this year.

Sales of China's domestically made automobiles topped 1.14 million units in June, up 36.5 per cent over the figure a year earlier, the fourth month in a row surpassing the 1.1 million units mark, the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers (CAAM) said.

China's vehicle sales in June rose to 1.14 million, the second-highest month to date after April's 1.15 million units, out of which passenger car sales hit a monthly record of 872,900 units, it said.

Total auto sales for the first half of the year (Jan- June) rose to 6.1 million, up 17.7 per cent from a year earlier, out-pacing the US market, where passenger car sales in the same period plunged to 4.8 million amid the economic slowdown.

CAAM said sales of such automobiles topped 1.14 million units in June, an increase of 36.5 per cent on the year.

This is the first time that sales of locally made automobiles surpassed 1.1 million units four months in a row, it said.

Dozens of baby girls in southern China have reportedly been taken from parents who broke family-planning laws, and then sold for adoption overseas.

An investigation by the state-owned Southern Metropolis News found that about 80 girls in one county had been sold for $3,000 (£1,800).

The babies were taken when the parents could not pay the steep fines imposed for having too many children.

Local officials may have forged papers to complete the deals, the report said.

Unpopular policy

Parents in rural areas are allowed two children, unlike urban dwellers who are allowed one.

But if they have more than that, they face a fine of about $3,000 -several times many farmers' annual income.

The policy is deeply unpopular among rural residents, says the BBC's Quentin Somerville in Beijing.

Nearly 80 baby girls in a county in Guizhou province, in the south of the country, were confiscated from their families when their parents could not or would not pay the fine, Southern Metropolis News said.

The girls were taken into orphanages and then adopted by couples from the United States and a number of European countries.

The adoption fee was split between the orphanages and local officials, the newspaper said.

Child trafficking is widespread. A tightening of adoption rules for foreigners in 2006 has proved ineffective in the face of local corruption.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1197054/Swine-flu-cases-Britain-soar-100-000-A-DAY-month-Government-warns.html

DEA to investigate michael jackson's death

Getty Images

A law enforcement official from Washington has confirmed that the Drug Enforcement Administration is joining the LAPD in investigating the death of Michael Jackson.

According to AP, the official reveals that the DEA was asked to step in because of the federal agency's resources, and information that they have on "pill mills" for illicit drugs. The DEA is set to investigate doctors that may have medicated Jackson, and look into whether or not the docs were registered to prescribe the drugs that they did.

Investigators will also examine whether a trafficking pattern was established between the King of Pop and the doctors, who sourced all of Michael's drugs.

Cherilyn Lee, a nurse who was close to Jackson, recently revealed that several months ago the singer begged her for the powerful sleep drug Diprivan (Propofol) -- and due to a frantic phone call from Michael's staff days before his death, she believes that Jackson may have gotten hold of it, even though she refused to administer it to him and advised him against its use. "I told him he may not wake up," said Lee.

There is still no official word on Jackson's cause of death.

Michael Jackson Dies

Michael JacksonWe've just learned Michael Jackson has died. He was 50. 

Michael suffered a cardiac arrest earlier this afternoon at his Holmby Hills home and paramedics were unable to revive him. We're told when paramedics arrived Jackson had no pulse and they never got a pulse back.

A source tells us Jackson was dead when paramedics arrived. A cardiologist at UCLA tells TMZ Jackson died of cardiac arrest.

Once at the hospital, the staff tried to resuscitate him but he was completely unresponsive.

We're told one of the staff members at Jackson's home called 911.

La Toya ran in the hospital sobbing after Jackson was pronounced dead.

Michael is survived by three children: Michael Joseph Jackson, Jr., Paris Michael Katherine Jackson and Prince "Blanket" Michael Jackson II.

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