As Obesity Rises, Remote Pacific Islands Plan to Abandon Junk Food
nytimes.com
nytimes.com
Eliminate a policy designed for the betterment of the population! So that's one of the aims of the WTO, to promote corporate interests, even when it's bad for the general population.
https://chomsky.info/secrets03/
Here is Bernie Sanders being visibly upset at raising immigration levels and instituting "open borders" policy:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vf-k6qOfXz0
I am kind of interested how the current liberals become pro-globalization all of the sudden. They went from organizing large anti-globalization riots, and getting tear gased fighting it, to "What do you mean? We love globalization!".
I want to see a more specific analysis in how the shift happened, and maybe a more detailed timeline. Certainly an interesting topic.
Here is of course Zuckerberg with his letter worrying that people are not buying the globalization shtick very well anymore:
http://www.bbc.com/news/business-38998884
If you squint enough to not notice the liberal veneer he puts on you might think he is one of the Koch brothers.
If you take everyone to the left of Reagan and put them all under one label of "liberal", then confusion understandably results. In particular, conflating Millian "liberals" with Marxist "socialists" with whoever happens to be running a street demo is a bad idea. The riots were specifically the work of the "black bloc", a small group of left-anarchists.
The general complaints of the (non-violent) protestors were to do with exactly this kind of thing - the use of a transnational process to override local environmental / labour law improvements for the profit of multinational companies.
The liberal (not socialist!) argument for free movement of people is partly the libertarian "why are you using force against a natural freedom" argument, and partly a pragmatic one that if capital now has free movement labour should as well.
A situation where capital can freely move to the most favourable jurisdiction but labour cannot is politically unsustainable.
(Yes, I left all this out of the original one-sentence snark.)
The riots was hyperbole, there were not the only ones advocating for anti-globalization. So was Bernie Sanders, Chomsky and many others. There were not tear gassed for it regularly but the ideology was there.
> A situation where capital can freely move to the most favourable jurisdiction but labour cannot is politically unsustainable.
The point was it was traditionally the Koch brothers and the like who advocated "globalization" not anyone calling themselves "the left". So it seems there was a reversal on the topic which I think is interesting.
You mention libertarianism, but that was usually closer aligned to conservatism than "leftism" so to speak.
> In particular, conflating Millian "liberals" with Marxist "socialists" with whoever happens to be running a street demo is a bad idea.
Yes that is the issue. I think both are referred to as "the left". And at some point it is worth pointing out the difference and seeing that from a traditional point there isn't much left left in "the left" (pun intended), which I think is interesting and was trying to find a more detailed analysis of it.
It seems to me there was split around the late 90s where the divisions are more like between "faux-liberalism + corporatism" (this includes Democrats like the Clintons and Obama), "faux-conservatism + corporatism" (Bushes), "conservatist populism" (Trump and company), "traditional left" (Sanders, Chomsky).
The "faux" bit is because the liberalism vs conservatism is a veneer used to attract whatever is deemed popular at the time. Latest Clinton campaign and Obama used identity politics and immigration to sell corporatism. Bush (junior mostly) used religion to sell "conservatism".
Also it is rather interesting that Trump capitalized on a traditional leftist position of anti-globalization (anti-NAFTA, pulling out of TPP, talk about workers etc). He probably saw a void there with Democrats abandoning that ideology and moved in opportunistically to capitalize on it.
There are a lot of groups under the "liberal" tent, like there are a lot of groups under the "conservative" tent.
https://www.amazon.com/Technological-Society-Jacques-Ellul/d...
Recent generations have been conditioned by society to accept globalisation - amongst other things. The book, which I only recently read myself, describes what has been happening for hundreds of years and it's to do with progress - technical progress, of which technology is just the pinnacle.
Those people who were against globalisation on the left were the old guard, the people who were strong supporters of trade unions and were proud of their local communities. Sanders is an example in the US, Corbyn or Skinner are examples in the UK.
He looks at these topics from a long term economic viewpoint. He has a left wing academic perspective, which clouds his conclusions though. There are lots of lectures from him on YouTube.
Personally I believe that whatever consenting adults get up to is none of the government's business, whether it's weird butt stuff or selling each other unlimited quantities of sugary water. If you're going to ban one, why not ban the other? They're both enjoyable to certain people and both have negative public health consequences.
-Samuel Butler, Erewhon.
Not satire as much these days, sadly.
Reminds me of the planet Norstrilia in Cordwainer Smith's fiction, which exports an astronomically precious immortality drug, yet maintains its archaic culture (resembling Australian ranchers with a British cultural inheritance) with import taxes of over 20000000%.
Depends who you ask. Some people understand the risks of junk food but still want it (same as with alcohol and tobacco). Junk food also tends to be cheaper per calorie.
Why draw the line there? Because hard drugs so directly impair the mind.
Not bellow junk food.
Hell, I'd be willing to bet that more people who eat junk food become effective "junk food addicts" and develop resultant health problesm as a percentage than do people who use LSD, MDMA, or even cocaine.
The food is designed to be a hyperstimulus, moreish beyond anything humans would find to eat in the wild.
How is the food not the problem?
but bananas? Yes, some people get fat eating too many fruits
You can gain weight on a high fruit diet, but bananas are an unusual choice. Fruit juice on the other hand is much easier way to gain weight, but like most processed foods less heathy.
And it's not like you're only eating fruit. These people would eat a normal meal and then snack on fruits constantly. So if they didn't eat fruit they'd only be getting 2000 calories a day, but it's quite easy to eat 500 calories of dried dates or dried figs.
In general, countries like that don't have unhealthy, locally-produced food. And the article agrees with that assertion. We have a patent on junk food.
Patently false assertion. I'm ethnically a pacific islander who grew up on a small island in Micronesia and I can assure you that local island dishes are quite unhealthy.
It's easy to attribute dishes as healthy when just considering fish and taro, but this fails to acknowledge its traditional preparation with high amounts of coconut milk, salt, and sugar. Seriously, when was the last time you saw a nutritional facts label for any traditional dish? I can only speak anecdotally in that traditional Samoan dishes are not unlike Micronesia to the degree that Georgia Southern foods are clearly distinct from Alabama's flavor (that is to say they're not).
I think one of the biggest problems is the dependence of poorer remote islands in the Pacific on less perishable foods: think canned goods like Spanish sausage, Spam, sardines, Palm corned beef (from NZ), etc. or cheap frozen meats by the box, e.g. ribs, chicken, turkey legs, etc.
When I was growing up, my father would make the ocassional business trip to the FSM (specifically Palau). He'd bring boxes of frozen ribs and chicken with him and exchange for coolers of fresh lobster with his local contacts. Throw in a few cases of canned Budweiser and those business negotiations always turned out great. This might sound crazy to people who grew up in 1st-world countries, but it's a thing, and if you grew up on the islands as I did, then you know precisely what's up.
Just a couple of quotes from the article that my assertion is based on fact.
Experts say the region’s health crisis is primarily driven by a decades-long shift from traditional diets based on root crops toward ones that are high in sugar, refined starch and processed foods.
It is so wrong what is being done to exploit these nations by providing a food supply that is not, in the long term, better for health,...
As I've pointed out in a previous comment, when was the last time you saw a label of nutritional facts on any local dish anywhere in the Pacfic that allowed vetting of such a claim? When traditional preparation methods of natural foods are simply dismissed without consideration, it's easy to attribute these foods as anything but unhealthy. That's the misjudgement I see having personally grown up on a wee little-known island in the Pacific.
The quotes in the article point out the seriousness of the issue primarily driven by foreign food products high in sugar, refined starch and processed foods. I'm definitely in agreement with this claim, but it does not--indeed cannot--assert as fact that locally-produced foods are intrinsically healthy, and by that I specifically mean how they're traditional prepared.
Which begs the question: Was rigorous Western medicine on the scene prior to foreign influence that it was able to ascertain the health baseline of an indigenous population prior to its exploitation? If foreign dietary choices disappeared overnight, that doesn't necessarily mean that overall population health will realize some normalcy comparable to the rest of the 1st world. I believe there are deeply rooted cultural norms distinct to each island that have yet to be addressed.
Countries are free to join the WTO, if they don't feel the package is worth it, they are free to opt out. What they can't do is get it piece-meal.
In this case a good reason, but I can just as equally imagine that (eg) some subsidy or tariff is there primarily to protect a powerful voting bloc, or friends of whichever government put the rule in place.
I would usually say exactly that. It's up to individuals to make decisions about what they do and do not eat and live with the consequences. Foods that accurately state their nutritional content and contain only ingredients that can be safely eaten in moderation should not be banned under ordinary circumstances because overconsumption is unhealthy. The rate of increase in obesity-related disease, however is astounding and arguably justifies extraordinary measures.
People loose sight of reality when they think pure choice is involved though. Food, smoking, drugs... a lot of things only make sense if you're particularly educated, have friends/family struggling with something, are particularly empathetic, or have experienced them.
True, but when that level of individual freedom has negative repercussions on the community, the government has to step in. Else the society will cease to be.
Imagine if our (USA) govt allowed us to buy gas (fuel, petrol) with lead in it, ignoring the long term impact of lead in the environment.
Individual freedom is not absolute. An one should not be allowed to engage in habits that harms the community in that fashion. Yes, there are things we can't avoid, but when necessary, the govt has the powers to regulate individual habits.
Unfortunately for these countries, membership in the WTO does not serve their interests in this regard.
Ought governments impose some incentive for individuals to earn as much taxable income as possible?
But if you accept that argument, where is the line? What personal decisions, if any shouldn't be subject to regulation?
Edit: I can't give you a list of personal decisions that I think should be subject to regulation, because it's not as simple as that, and there's a debate to be had for each one, and that will depend on circumstances and ideology. But I do think that in this case it's reasonable, since the cost of treating diabetes patients is crippling a small, poor country.
Moving on, the people should by default be free to make decisions that are not in their best interests. Just because you can't control yourself from eating candy doesn't mean my Right to Candy should be taken away as well.
Taking away liberty must be very, very carefully considered. What is the harm being prevented? What price is being paid to remove it? Seatbelts are a low cost to implement, a low cost to wear, and offer a high return of value in lives and health saved.
Banning imported food at tourist established is a much less obvious win. If I can't indulge in a sugary treat on vacation then when can I? That sounds like something the local agriculture industry is lobbying for more than anything. Who benefits the most from this change? Follow the money and I bet (heh) you'll find the big winners aren't the obese population.
I agree, and it's possible that this move has been very carefully considered. The obesity levels are catastrophic, and the trend has been clear for years (maybe decades), so it's quite possible that this move has been considered for some time before finally being implemented. There's no reason not to give the benefit of the doubt here.
I'd also add that any move to take away liberty needs to be reviewed at some point. Otherwise the tendency is for more and more regulation. Then typically the only way things get changed is by major lobbying efforts, which can takes years or decades, or when a negative effect on society has become such a problem that it's no longer possible to ignore it. In the meantime, a lot of people have had their lives impacted.
> Banning imported food at tourist established is a much less obvious win
Yeah, though maybe that part is related to the "effort to promote local agriculture" that's also mentioned in the article. It still seems like something that would have little actual impact - it's hard to believe that tourists are coming and only eating junk food, and not any food that's locally grown. No-one goes on holiday and eats only Pringles.
Or maybe it's about perceived fairness - staff at tourist resorts have access to foods that the rest of the population can't buy, so they remove that access to put everyone on the same level.
I want to live in a country where it's easy to be lean, so that as many people as possible are lean, because there are no downsides to being lean, and infinite upsides.
Paying in relation to what you use seems fair. Sending small packages costs less than big heavy packages. What's a few bucks' difference anyway?
Then how come most grocery stores have healthy food?
If it truly was a minority group that wanted to eat healthy food, what right do they have to force the majority to buy what they want to make it more economical? Although the premise is flawed, because the real reason 'healthy food' is expensive is because the foods considered healthy inherently cannot use many methods that increase yield like pesticides. And then some go so far as to claim GMO's are unhealthy/cannot be organic, further driving up the prices of foods that get to wear the healthy food labels. Increasing demand for healthy food would make it more expensive, certainly in the short term.
All over America there are many areas known as "food deserts" because stores do not stock fresh foods and produce. In those areas the only food readily available is shelf-stable, highly processed, very high caloric density junk food.
Now think about being on a Pacific island where leaving your food desert is not just a matter of a long drive or bus ride down the road to a different community.
The TEL industry fought very hard against such action first by attacking the science, then fighting in courts and political arenas. Imagine if they had access to a super-national court explicitly created as a way for large corporations to punish governments for creating laws that are bad for their business?
Good, then I guess the government should tell everyone to exercise too? I mean, people not exercising has negative repercussions on the community, so the government has to step in. Mandatory exercise for everyone.
I guess the same logic applies to limiting gaming/Internet time too.
Lead has a quantifiable effect that directly infringes on the rights of others -- eating junk food does not. You cannot say that my choice to get fat infringes on anyone's freedoms more than you are infringing on my freedom by preventing me from eating what I choose. It's not a characteristic of a free society. Pure democracy is mob rule. We might as well ban gay marriage, too, because there are more people who don't like it and claim it infringes on their rights than there are people who want to get gay marriages (see how that can be twisted the other way?)
Well, if you have to receive public assistance because of your bad eating habits, then that's a "quantifiable effect" on my pocket book.
The worst of all worlds is when an otherwise-healthy 37 year old can't buy insurance because he had his gallbladder out in his early 20s. Which is what we had before obamacare.
I mean, if one person makes a bad decision, you can say, OK, we all make mistakes, but a room full of smart? people...
But I do wonder what the bloody hell is going on in Vanuatu! Maybe Polynesian populations have metabolic adaptations that don't work with high-sugar diets? It does seem so:[0]
> Pacific people (especially Micronesian and Polynesian) have some of the highest rates of obesity and diabetes in the world that largely developed since the introduction of western culture and diet. Recent studies suggest that much of the risk relates to the excessive intake of sugar (sucrose) and carbohydrates, leading to a type of fat storage syndrome (metabolic syndrome). Here we discuss some of the environmental, genetic and epigenetic reasons why this group might be especially prone to developing obesity and diabetes compared to other ethnic groups. Indirect evidence suggests that the higher endogenous uric acid levels in the Polynesian-Micronesian population may represent a predisposing factor for the development of obesity and diabetes in the context of Western diets and lifestyles. Pacific people may be an ideal group to study the role of “thrifty genes” in the pathogenesis of the current obesity epidemic.
That's arguably a good enough reason to ban junk food imports.
0) http://www.fizz.org.nz/sites/fizz.org.nz/files/2%20Fat%20Sto...
" planning to outlaw all imported food at government functions and tourist establishments across the province’s 13 inhabited islands. "
Additionally most of these imported items inherently cost more than local foods in a lot of places anyways so it's not completely out of the norm.
Whether a government should have the mechanism of banning foods that are safe to eat in moderation available to it is a different question than whether it would be good policy given that mechanism.
If the government should be in the habit of regulating nutrition, banning foods with exceptionally poor nutritional qualities is probably good policy, but is that the kind of thing governments should be regulating at all? I would argue that it usually isn't and should only be permitted in exceptional circumstances.
On the other hand, people will be unable to satisfy their sugar addiction (sugar is completely unnecessary from a nutritional point of view, and harmful even at low doses).
Nothing comes "free". If there is an alcoholic in the family, that lowers the whole family's nurturance level, degrades the marriage, increases the probability of divorce, and undeniably hurts the kids. Sugar addiction is no different from alcohol addiction. The addict isn't the only one who suffers. Similarly, if your social circle is fat, you're more likely to be, and stay, fat. Getting rid of junk food has no downsides, unlike getting rid of alcohol. Junk food is harmful even in low doses, whereas alcohol isn't in moderation.
1) Banning certain restaurants would have a positive net effect on society.
2) Any government with the authority to ban restaurants would choose which restaurants to ban incorrectly, due to honest mistakes, influence from lobbying, or other reasons, and the end net effect on society would be negative.
Qualitative: We are banning "junk food". (What constitutes junk food?)
Quantitative: We are banning any foods where the sugar content exceeds 1% (Where this number can become increasingly stricter) of the food's mass. eg. Coke is 9% sugar[0]; 39 / (355 + 39 + 39 + .045) = 0.09.
[0] http://www.myfitnesspal.com/food/calories/coca-cola-12oz-can...
Your idea is inevitably going to have problems as well. What about selling table sugar itself? What about fruit, which can also be around 10% sugar? What about desserts and confectionery? Are we really wanting the government to ban those completely?
1. I support ban/taxes on junk food.
2. Government doesn't do it, does something else.
3. I' still not satisfied, and still support ban/taxes on junk food.
I have opinions. So do you. What the government does is irrelevant to what I believe.
The opinion we're discussing is whether governments ought to be able to ban restaurants, so what governments do is absolutely relevant.
I'm saying the government should ban it. You're arguing the government should, but shouldn't be able to. That only makes sense if you adhere to a set of arbitrary political "principles", which I view as nonsense. Government needs to solve problems, not obey imaginary rules.
Pacific Islanders like to eat. I think it's ingrained in their culture. Before you call me out and ask for a citation, let me just say this is based on my experience as a Fiji Islander. But maybe there's no problem with eating a lot, if what you eat is healthy. So instead of reaching for the local produce, the cheaper and more attractive "Western" product wins out. Plus, it's just a tad more cheaper.
P.S. It's very easy to buy Singles or Loosies (sp?) in Fiji.
Eastern European immigrants stayed thin. Chinese immigrants stayed thin. Immigrants from some other countries - mostly south america in my personal experience - all gained weight quickly.
The food does make it much easier to gain weight.
A high tax on imports may simply lead to imports being smuggled in, and tax stamps being forged. A total ban can be trivially enforced---see a junk food container, its illegal.
This, coupled with a "modern" lifestyle of less and less manual labor results in an overabundance of unspent caloric intake. As the article in [2] says, which specifically talks about Micronesia but is applicable elsewhere in the Pacific:
"Micronesians are essentially selling their own natural food resources for a fraction of the true value, and then using the revenue to import nutrient-poor food (...) The FSM does not have the infrastructure to realistically compete in the global tuna market. Thus, the current structure of the Pacific tuna industry is an example of how lack of development (partly due to the U.S subsidies and U.S. dependence) has lead the FSM to continue to be dependent on foreign nations. The cash-economy stemming from the tuna industry contributes to the continued cycle of food dependence, imported-food, and poor diet, which is partly responsible for Micronesia's unhealthy, obese population."
Edit: As with regard to Vanuatu specifically, you can read a report on their food, agriculture, and fishery situation here [3], authored by FAO of the UN. To paraphrase, widespread industrial fishing by foreign nations was prevalent decades ago, but has since shifted to other Pacific states. Subsistence fishing occurs, but the cash-based economy (i.e. where you buy your food, rather than catch it) is much larger, and the presence of tourism sites has priced most locals out of domestically-caught fish, while leaving imported chicken and domestic beef affordable, as well as imported canned fish. This report doesn't mention foods typically considered junk food, but calorie-dense imports of shelf-stable food are documented elsewhere.
[1] http://www.nature.com/ng/journal/v48/n9/full/ng.3620.html [2] https://globalizationandhealth.biomedcentral.com/articles/10... [3] http://www.fao.org/fi/oldsite/FCP/en/VUT/profile.htm
I know of Samoan families that have spent thousands of dollars on corned beef (the stuff in a tin) for weddings.
Just the last night I was having dinner with a Samoan bloke, he ate 5 packs of instant noodles, 3 croissants, and half a chicken for dinner. I've seen him also eat 2 tins of spaghetti, 2 tins of corned beef, and half a loaf of white bread for dinner. He's in New Zealand, there's no shortage of fresh food and vegetables, and there's no reason for eating that much food (as everybody else near him points out).
Now I'm not sure what made it a cultural thing to eat obscene amounts of food, but it's deeply ingrained, the majority of Polynesians in New Zealand are obese, they have a whole slew of health problems because of it.
Blaming "modern" lifestyle rarely makes sense in global context - it's not as if in countries with low obesity rates one has to hunt and gather their food.
Yet in this short span of time, traditions haven't adjusted for the altered diet, air-conditioned comfort, and sudden lack of need to perform manual labor (which is now done by foreign migrant workers instead). So far in Qatar, government spending on healthcare has not been able to stem the rise in obesity, so other social health promotion programmes are being deployed.
There are developed countries (with relaxed lifestyles) at the top of the obesity ratings, there are developed countries (with relaxed lifestyles) at the bottom of the obesity ratings, lifestyle change does not seem to correlate very heavily.