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four years after the United States' 2020 presidential race, former President Donald Trump and many of allies continue to make the false, repeatedly debunked claim that the election was stolen from him. And prominent GOP members of Congress, including Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-New York), will not commit to accepting the 2024 election results if President Joe Biden is reelected in November.

Since 2021, the watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) has maintained a "sedition tracker" that monitors corporations and political figures who promote the Big Lie and election denialism in some way. And according to an announcement published on June 4, CREW is modifying its system for exposing Big Lie supporters in either government or business.

"In order to more precisely track companies' political giving to members of Congress who are undermining democracy," CREW explains, "we have created a new system for scoring companies' support for democracy based on how much they are giving to members who have done the most to undermine it. Only companies that donated to the 168 members who ran on the Big Lie or voted to overturn the 2020 election are included, but the gifts are weighted to differentiate between those who have gone even further to advance the Big Lie and undermine democracy, both in the leadup to January 6th and since."

READ MORE: ['All she has to do is shut up': Ex-GOP rep skewers RNC chair for risking Senate over Trump 'vanities'

According to CREW, the criteria includes: (1) "voted against certification of the 2020 election results or ran on the Big Lie," (2) "voted against establishing the January 6th Committee," (3) "supported" Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton's lawsuit to overturn the 2020 election results in four states that Biden won, (4) "supported absolute immunity for presidents," and (5) "voted against second Trump impeachment."

"The data on this page will be updated as new filings come in and are processed," CREW notes. "To create our company scores, we use these criteria to weight each member's relative anti-democracy rating, and then use that coefficient to calculate each donor company's score."

CREW lists some of the companies that have the "worst scores" when it comes to democracy.

The top five companies CREW names are Koch Industries, AT&T, American Crystal Sugar, Lockheed Martin and United Parcel Service (UPS).

*Read CREW's full announcement at this link.

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Consumer Confidential: A former corn-syrup lobbyist is drafting new federal dietary rules (seriously)

Valley News

Experts: Non-GMO Certification of GMO-Derived Sweetener Sets a 'Dangerous Precedent'

By Ken Roseboro

Consumer advocates and non-GMO food experts have criticized the non-GMO certification of Cargill's EverSweet sweetener by NSF's Non-GMO True North program because the product is derived from a genetically engineered yeast and should be considered a GMO.

...

ew 918

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/11/13/health/colombia-soda-tax-obesity.html

Planet Fat

Articles in this series are exploring the causes and the consequences of rising obesity rates around the world.

NESTLÉ GOES DOOR-TO-DOOR

How Big Business Got Brazil’s Poor Hooked on Junk Food

RESHAPING AFRICAN PALATES

Obesity Was Rising as Ghana Embraced Fast Food. Then Came KFC.

THE SODA TAX SHOWDOWN

She Took On Colombia’s Soda Industry. Then She Was Silenced.

A U.S.-STYLE DIET

A Nasty, Nafta-Related Surprise: Mexico’s Soaring Obesity

STRANGE BEDFELLOWS

In Asia’s Fattest Country, Nutritionists Take Money From Food Giants

A FATHER'S FIGHT

One Man’s Stand Against Junk

She Took On Colombia’s Soda Industry. Then She Was Silenced.

The debate over taxing sugary drinks has turned into a ferocious global

policy brawl. In Colombia, proponents faced intimidation and censorship.

Leer en español

By ANDREW JACOBS and

MATT RICHTEL

NOV. 13, 2017

BOGOTÁ, Colombia — It began with menacing phone calls, strange malfunctions of the office computers, and men in parked cars photographing the entrance to the small consumer advocacy group’s offices.

Then at dusk one day last December, Dr. Esperanza Cerón, the head of the organization, said she noticed two strange men on motorcycles trailing her Chevy sedan as she headed home from work. She tried to lose them in Bogotá’s rush-hour traffic, but they edged up to her car and pounded on the windows.

“If you don’t keep your mouth shut,” one man shouted, she recalled in a recent interview, “you know what the consequences will be.”

The episode, which Dr. Cerón reported to federal investigators, was reminiscent of the intimidation often used against those who challenged the drug cartels that once dominated Colombia. But the narcotics trade was not the target of Dr. Cerón and her colleagues. Their work had upset a different multibillion-dollar industry: the makers of soda and other sugar-sweetened beverages.

Their organization, Educar Consumidores, was the most visible proponent of a proposed 20 percent tax on sugary drinks that was heading for a vote that month in Colombia’s Legislature.The group had raised money, rallied allies to the cause and produced a provocative television ad that warned consumers how sugar-laden beverages can lead to obesity and diet-related illnesses like diabetes.

...

Planet Fat

Articles in this series are exploring the causes and the consequences of rising obesity rates around the world.

NESTLÉ GOES DOOR-TO-DOOR

How Big Business Got Brazil’s Poor Hooked on Junk Food

RESHAPING AFRICAN PALATES

Obesity Was Rising as Ghana Embraced Fast Food. Then Came KFC.

THE SODA TAX SHOWDOWN

She Took On Colombia’s Soda Industry. Then She Was Silenced.

A U.S.-STYLE DIET

A Nasty, Nafta-Related Surprise: Mexico’s Soaring Obesity

STRANGE BEDFELLOWS

In Asia’s Fattest Country, Nutritionists Take Money From Food Giants

A FATHER'S FIGHT

One Man’s Stand Against Junk

She Took On Colombia’s Soda Industry. Then She Was Silenced.

The debate over taxing sugary drinks has turned into a ferocious global

policy brawl. In Colombia, proponents faced intimidation and censorship.

Leer en español

By ANDREW JACOBS and

MATT RICHTEL

NOV. 13, 2017

“If you don’t keep your mouth shut,” one man shouted, she recalled in a recent interview, “you know what the consequences will be.”

Their organization, Educar Consumidores, was the most visible proponent of a proposed 20 percent tax on sugary drinks that was heading for a vote that month in Colombia’s Legislature. The group had raised money, rallied allies to the cause and produced a provocative television ad that warned consumers how sugar-laden beverages can lead to obesity and diet-related illnesses like diabetes.

The backlash was fierce. A Colombian government agency, responding to a complaint by the nation’s leading soda company that called the ad misleading, ordered it off the air. Then the agency went further: It prohibited Dr. Cerón and her colleagues from publicly discussing the health risks of sugar, under penalty of a $250,000 fine.

Dr. Esperanza Cerón, director of Educar Consumidores, a group that campaigned for a tax on sugary drinks. Colombia’s consumer protection agency barred her from talking about the link between sugar and obesity. Credit Juan Arredondo for The New York Times

The battle over taxing sugar-sweetened beverages is becoming one of the world’s most ferocious policy brawls — a clash of science, politics and money in dozens of countries and cities.

“The industry sees sugary-drink taxes as an existential threat,” said Dr. James Krieger, executive director of Healthy Food America, which tracks beverage tax initiatives. In the United States, the industry has spent at least $107 million at the state and local levels since 2009 to beat back soda taxes and beverage warning labels, a new study found. Compared to the domestic tactics, Dr. Krieger said, overseas, “it’s much dirtier, much more bare-knuckled.”

The harassment of Dr. Cerón and her colleagues was never proven to be carried out by the industry, and federal prosecutors declined to investigate. In response to questions from The New York Times, Coke and Pepsi said they were not involved, and Postobón, the soda company that filed the complaint about the organization’s ad, deferred comment to The National Business Association of Colombia. The association, which represented national and international beverage makers on the soda tax issue, said it had nothing to do with the episodes.

The International Council of Beverages Associations, the parent organization of trade groups around the world fighting the taxes, would not directly answer the question about whether its allies in Colombia were connected to the alleged harassment, but it condemned such actions.

“We reject under any circumstance the improper influence or harassment of any individual or organization for any purpose, at any time, in any way,” Katherine W. Loatman, executive director of the organization, said in a statement.

The experience in Colombia may be the most extreme, but a juggernaut of industry opposition has killed or stalled soda tax proposals around the globe, including in Russia, Germany, Israel and New Zealand.

Nevertheless, the idea is gaining momentum; such levies have been enacted in 30 countries, including India, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, Thailand, Britain and Brunei. More than a billion people now live in places where such taxes have driven up the price of sugar-sweetened beverages.

The battles have been particularly intense in emerging markets as the industry seeks to make up for falling soda consumption in wealthier nations. Latin America has surpassed the United States as the world’s biggest soft-drink market, according to the World Health Organization, with sales of carbonated soft drinks doubling there since 2000 while they declined in the United States.

The beverage industry asserts that soda taxes unfairly burden the poor, cause higher unemployment by squeezing industry sales, and fail to achieve their policy goal: reducing obesity. Studies of soda taxes have shown they lead to a drop in sales of sugar-sweetened beverages — a 10 percent sales decline, for example, over the first two years of Mexico’s tax — however, such measures are so new that there is not yet evidence of their impact on health.

“Slapping a tax on our products and walking away won’t do anything about obesity in this country or globally,” said William Dermody, spokesman for the American Beverage Association, an industry trade group.

The soda industry claimed a tax on sugary drinks would harm mom-and-pop shops like this one in Bogotá. Credit Juan Arredondo for The New York Times

But public health organizations, including the W.H.O., cite soda taxes as one of the most effective policy tools for cutting consumption of what nutritionists call a “liquid candy” that has contributed to an epidemic of obesity and related health conditions around the world. Dr. Kathryn Backholer, an expert on the issue at Deakin University in Australia, said taxes on soda were “low-hanging fruit” in the fight against obesity, diabetes and other weight-related diseases because such drinks are easily categorized to tax and sensible to target because they “have little or no nutritional value.”

Dr. Backholer and other experts said the turning point for soda tax proponents came in 2014, when Mexico — Coca-Cola’s biggest consumer market by per capita consumption — approved a 10 percent tax.

Mexico also showcased how dirty the fight could get.

Last year, numerous advocates of a proposal to double Mexico’s tax to 20 percent received strings of upsetting and fraudulent texts from unknown numbers. One man got a message saying his daughter had been seriously injured; another found a text saying his wife was having an affair; a third received a link to a funeral home. Spyware was found on the phones. The proposal failed.

Planet Fat

Articles in this series are exploring the causes and the consequences of rising obesity rates around the world.

NESTLÉ GOES DOOR-TO-DOOR

How Big Business Got Brazil’s Poor Hooked on Junk Food

RESHAPING AFRICAN PALATES

Obesity Was Rising as Ghana Embraced Fast Food. Then Came KFC.

THE SODA TAX SHOWDOWN

She Took On Colombia’s Soda Industry. Then She Was Silenced.

A U.S.-STYLE DIET

A Nasty, Nafta-Related Surprise: Mexico’s Soaring Obesity

STRANGE BEDFELLOWS

In Asia’s Fattest Country, Nutritionists Take Money From Food Giants

A FATHER'S FIGHT

One Man’s Stand Against Junk Food as Diabetes Climbs Across India

Elsewhere in the world, soda companies have assiduously worked their government connections and economic clout. In internal company emails leaked to an American watchdog group last year, Coke executives described strategies for winning over government ministers and other officials in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Ecuador, Portugal, and regions of Spain.

The Australian Beverages Council wrote in its 2016 annual report that fighting a soft drinks tax “has been consuming vast amounts of resources,” and that “our learnings from other markets through our international network tells us that these types of threats must be constantly challenged before they get before a parliament for debate.”

In Colombia, where soda is often cheaper than bottled water, the soda-tax fight took place in a key market for beverage makers. Sales volume of carbonated drinks here has climbed more than 25 percent over the past 15 years; during that same time in the United States, it fell 12 percent, according to Euromonitor, a market research firm.

Coke and Pepsi were far less visible in the Colombia battle, leaving the big national beverage company, Postobón, in the spotlight. Postobón, a drinks maker and distributor for Pepsi, is part of a huge conglomerate that includes sugar cane growers, sugar mills and the country’s biggest media company, RCN Televisión, which helped disseminate the anti-tax message. Postobón and RCN declined interview requests.

The stage was set for a clash between a powerful industry and a stubborn public advocate.

Showdown Over an Ad

In early 2016, Colombia, a nation of 49 million, was facing the unfamiliar prospect of stability and peace. After decades of civil war and narco-terrorism, Colombians were enjoying the fruits of an aggressive United States-backed military campaign that had largely decimated the country’s drug cartels. Unemployment was near historical lows, the poverty rate was dropping and millions were hopeful about the possibility of lasting peace with the country’s main rebel group, the FARC.

In March 2016, the country’s health minister, Alejandro Gaviria Uribe, proposed a 20 percent tax on soda and sugar-sweetened beverages — the equivalent of about 10 cents on a liter bottle — that became part of a larger tax overhaul backed by Colombia’s president and the Ministry of Finance.

“For the first time in our lives, we thought we might become a normal country and be able to deal with issues other than violence,” said Diana Guarnizo, a lawyer with Dejusticia, a rights group that helped promote the soda tax. “Here we were, an organization that had dealt with peace, violence, land reform and gross injustice, and suddenly we had the luxury to talk about what mothers are putting in their children’s lunchboxes.”

The measure was designed to inject $340 million a year into Colombia’s chronically underfunded national health care system, but Mr. Gaviria had a larger goal: to dampen soda consumption in a country with an obesity rate that had tripled since 1980 to 19 percent of adults. The fastest growth had occurred among Colombian youth from ages 5 to 17. Each year, 4,000 people age 30 to 70 die from obesity-related illnesses like heart disease and diabetes, the Health Ministry said.

Dr. Iván Darío Escobar, an endocrinologist, left, used a soda bottle for patient education in Bogotá. Right, a patient and her nutritionist at a monthly weigh-in.

The issue attracted the attention of Dr. Cerón, whose 10-employee organization had previously worked on climate change, smoking restrictions and the lack of potable water in poor communities. Encouraged by the health minister’s soda tax announcement, they formed a coalition of three dozen civic organizations they called the Alliance for Food Health.

They received crucial support fromBloomberg Philanthropies, a foundation created by Michael Bloomberg, the former New York mayor, which dispatched experts from the United States. It also provided pivotal funding, including $260,000 for the public service ad — an amount nearly equal to Educar’s entire annual budget — and paid for enhanced security at the group’s offices.

Opinion polls showed that 70 percent of the public embraced the tax. Legislative backing was harder to come by, however: 42 legislators in the 268-seat Congress said they supported the measure.

The debate escalated in August, with Congress still months from a vote, when television stations across the country began airing a public service announcement in support of the tax. The 30-second spot, produced by Dr. Cerón’s group, used data from the W.H.O. and featured a smartly dressed man drinking a series of sugary beverages throughout the day. Four sweetened drinks a day, the ad said, could deliver up to 47 teaspoons of sugar. Then it showed an overweight couple, a gangrenous foot and what appeared to be a man in cardiac arrest, followed by an admonition. “Better to drink water, milk or teas without sugar,” the narrator said. “Take care of your life. Take it seriously.”

An Educar Consumidores worker handed out pamphlets on healthy eating in the Ciudad Kennedy district of Bogotá. Credit Juan Arredondo for The New York Times

Postobón, the soft drink company, promptly filed a complaint with the government’s consumer protection agency, the Superintendent of Industry and Commerce, claiming that the ad’s use of the teaspoon as a unit of measurement was imprecise and that it unfairly suggested that all sweetened drinks were unhealthy.

Nutrition experts countered that the ad was wholly consistent with established science showing the impact of excess sugar consumption on weight and metabolic diseases like diabetes, gout and heart disease. The Harvard School of Public Health has chronicled multiple studies backing up this assertion, including a point nutritionists make repeatedly: that sugary beverages lack nutritional value and add calories without leaving consumers feeling full.

Dr. Luis Fernando Gómez, a professor of preventive medicine at Javeriana University in Bogotá who backed the tax measure, said Postobón’s allegations about the commercial were disingenuous. “Every fact and figure cited in that ad was backed up by mainstream science,” he said.

But the head of the Colombian consumer protection agency, a presidential appointee, sided with the industry petitioners. Just two weeks later, in a decision that Colombian legal experts described as unusually swift, the agency ordered the commercial withdrawn.

Borrowing almost identical language from Postobón’s complaint — which had been filed by a company lawyer who had previously led the agency — the superintendent’s office said consumers had the right to truthful information, not messages that were “misleading, imprecise and confusing.”

The ruling went on to bar Educar Consumidores employees from speaking publicly about the links between sugar and obesity, an edict so sweeping it included the Health Ministry’s own research on the subject.

The consumer agency did not respond to requests for comment.

The actions stunned legal analysts and health advocates. “It was unprecedented,” said Ch’uya H. Lane, regional director for obesity prevention efforts at the Global Health Advocacy Incubator, which is affiliated with Bloomberg Philanthropies.

“We were completely shut down,” Dr. Cerón said. “Censored.”

Criminal Inquiry Over a Blog Post

Postobón is a unit of one of Colombia’s largest and most respected conglomerates, Organización Ardila Lülle. Founded in the early 1950s by Carlos Ardila Lülle, 87, Organización Ardila Lülle has helped define the country’s modern identity through a raft of companies that own a soccer team, an insurance company and the dealerships that sell Dodge, Jeep and Ford vehicles.

Postobón is a storied brand that sells a rainbow of homegrown drinks. Among its best-known products are a cola called Colombiana and Manzana Postobón, a century-old apple-flavored drink that is something of a national icon.

A delivery of soft drinks in Bogotá. Postobón, the leading beverage company in Colombia, is part of the conglomerate that owns an influential media company. Credit Juan Arredondo for The New York Times

Organización Ardila Lülle remained silent during the soda-tax debate, and company executives declined to be interviewed. Instead, Postobón, RCN and allies like the National Business Association of Colombia carried the message that the tax would cost jobs, decimate independent convenience shop owners and choke the economy.

“In Colombia, the sugar industry and the main media companies belong to the same economic conglomerates,” Mr. Gaviria, the health minister, said. “They have an intimidating power. And they used it.”

That fall, at least 90 lobbyists worked to sway legislators, according to a tally of visitor logs obtained by Educar Consumidores. During committee hearings on the measure, lobbyists often sat next to lawmakers, a flagrant violation of congressional rules, said Óscar Ospina Quintero, a legislator from the Green Alliance party. Mr. Ospina said he protested the lobbyists’ presence in the chamber but was rebuffed by congressional leaders.

“The response was fierce,” Mr. Gaviria said. “I remember that, during one of the debates, a senator said to me: ‘In all my years in Congress I’ve never seen a lobbying effort like this.’”

In October, not long after she was censored by the government, Dr. Cerón found a tactic she thought might keep attention on the subject without running afoul of the government’s order silencing her. In a blog item posted on the Alliance for Food Health website, she made fun of an RCN soap opera from 1980s called “Azúcar,” or Sugar, that was set in Colombia’s sugar cane heartland. Scrawled across a publicity poster for the show, she wrote, “It’s one thing to watch Sugar; it’s another to drink it in excess.”

An RCN lawyer demanded she delete the post, claiming it was intellectual property theft. She complied, but the network filed a complaint with federal prosecutors who, in turn, opened a criminal investigation. The case, still pending, carries a possible fine of $300,000.

“If they win,” she said. “I will be financially ruined.”

It was around this time that employees at Educar’s offices began to complain about echoes and other voices on their cellphones. They suspected they might be under surveillance. Others found it hard to use the internet in the office. In October, Dr. Cerón’s office phone ceased functioning entirely. “Sometimes we could not work at all because our laptops would stop following orders and the mouse would just do what it wanted,” Diana Vivas, the group’s lawyer, said.

Ms. Lane of Bloomberg Philanthropies was so concerned that she stopped using email and the phone to discuss strategy with Educar. Instead, she moved communications to some of the same encrypted apps used after the surveillance of soda-tax advocates was discovered in Mexico.

Called in to investigate, Andrés Erazo, Educar’s longtime tech consultant, said he discovered that antivirus software on workplace computers had been disabled. He also found spyware on the office router that gave an unknown outsider access to the organization’s web traffic and online communication. According to Mr. Erazo, three cellphones — including those used by Dr. Cerón and Ms. Vivas — had been compromised by spyware.

Mr. Erazo urged Dr. Cerón to buy new cellphones but she refused. “If they’re listening to us, what are they going to hear?” he recalled her telling him. “We’re talking about a public health campaign!”

An independent examination of Educar’s computers conducted for The New York Times by CSIETE, an internet security firm in Bogotá, did not turn up any malware. Giovanni Cruz Forero, the firm’s chief executive, said Educar employees had reformated one of the two office laptops the firm examined, which would have largely erased evidence of tampering. Mr. Cruz said it was also possible intruders took steps to erase their digital footprints. The firm did not examine cellphones of Educar employees.

One morning in mid-November, Dr. Cerón was startled awake at 5 a.m. by a call to her cellphone.

“Shut up, you old wench,” the caller yelled, according to a report she filed with the Fiscal General de la Nación, Colombia’s prosecutorial agency.

In early December, Dr. Cerón was walking to the gym when a man, his face obscured by a hooded sweatshirt, accosted her with the same message. “Cállese,” he yelled before walking away, or, “keep your mouth shut.”

She reported both episodes to prosecutors.

A spokesman for the prosecutorial agency declined to comment on Dr. Céron’s complaints, citing privacy rules that bar discussion of cases with anyone not directly involved.

Dr. Cerón stopped driving alone. And she pressed the local news media to cover the intimidation, but it was facing its own challenges from tax opponents.

Pressuring the Media

With its cordon of armed guards, bomb-sniffing dogs and airport-style X-ray machines, the headquarters of Colombia’s oldest newspaper, El Espectador, is among the most heavily fortified compounds in the country. The need for such measures is driven home by a sixth-floor display: showcased behind glass is a yellowing front page reporting the assassination of El Espectador’s editor, Guillermo Cano, who was gunned down on Dec. 17, 1986, as he drove home from work.

Three years later, a huge truck bomb shattered the newspaper’s offices, killing a reporter and wounding 83 others. During the 1980s and 1990s, violence claimed the lives of a dozen El Espectador employees — all victims of Colombian drug cartels angered by the newspaper’s unflinching coverage.

El Espectador news editors said they sought to cover the soda tax fight evenhandedly in the news pages, even as the paper supported the tax in its editorials.

Fidel Cano, center, publisher of El Espectador, in the paper’s newsroom in Bogotá. Credit Juan Arredondo for The New York Times

Industry executives were not happy with the paper’s stance, but they got especially upset when it produced a video, part of a biweekly commentary called La Pulla, that lampooned tax opponents for ignoring scientific evidence about the risks of excess sugar.

“Once we published the video, things got crazy,” the paper’s health and science editor, Pablo Correa, said.

With a tone both cheeky and indignant, La Pulla takes on the most contentious issues of the day. In the soda tax episode, the host, María Paulina Baena, with granules of sugar flecking her lips, skewered the industry and members of Congress for spreading misinformation about the proposed tax. She ended the video with the image of a Sprite bottle and a tagline from one of the popular ads for the drink: “That’s just the way it is.”

The video was posted just before midnight on Dec. 15, quickly drawing 500,000 views. In the morning, Fidel Cano, the publisher of El Espectador and a nephew of the paper’s slain editor, said he had received a call from a senior advertising executive at the newspaper who told him a representative from Coca-Cola had called in protest and demanded that the Sprite bottle be removed.

Mr. Cano winced recalling what came next. With the prospect of litigation and lost ad revenue, he says he ordered the bottle edited out. In a small act of defiance, he allowed the Sprite advertisement tagline to remain.

The altered video went viral, drawing more than two million views and prompting a public discussion about censorship and the power of the soda industry.

“Did they win?” Mr. Cano reflected. “Not really.”

María Paulina Baena, a journalist at El Espectador who writes and presents the online video commentary La Pulla. Credit Juan Arredondo for The New York Times

Reached by phone, the newspaper’s vice president for advertising, Mauricio Umaña, disputed Mr. Cano’s account, saying he had not received a call from Coca-Cola or any other soda company executive.

Other media outlets felt the industry’s pressure.

At the Colombian branch of the online news site Vice, the editorial staff clashed with advertising executives over their efforts to squelch a column criticizing the soda industry. Vice had previously run two opinion pieces in favor of the soda tax and the disputed third column did ultimately run, though not on the home page, making it hard for readers to find.

The incident was part of what prompted Vice Colombia’s founding editor, Juan Camilo Maldonado, to resign. Mr. Maldonado declined to be interviewed for this article but colleagues with direct knowledge of the incident said he was dismayed the company would cave to pressure from advertisers.

A spokesman for Vice did not address the reasons for Mr. Maldonado’s resignation, but said, “The fact that all of the stories were published and were critical of the soda industry speaks for itself.”

On the last day of 2016, opponents of the tax were victorious. Using a complex procedural maneuver, congressional leaders killed the soda tax, dropping it from the larger tax overhaul package.

“The problem isn’t just sugar,” said Iván Duque, a senator from the right-leaning Democratic Center party and a contender in next year’s presidential race, who was a vocal critic of the tax. “We need a national plan to fight sedentary lifestyles, better product labeling and education efforts that teach people to eat more fruit, fish and vegetables.”

A New Drink

Dr. Cerón and her team got a Pyrrhic victory two weeks ago when the country’s Constitutional Court overturned the consumer agency’s decision to silence Educar and ordered the agency to “abstain from censoring any other ad related to public health in the future,” according to the ruling.

“It was a great victory for free speech in Colombia,” Dr. Cerón said. “The only pity is it came too late.”

Photo

Dr. Cerón, right, at the Educar Consumidores headquarters in Bogotá.The Constitutional Court two weeks ago overturned the decision that silenced the group. Credit Juan Arredondo for The New York Times

Last summer, Postobón began what it called “a new social strategy focused on nutrition.” The campaign, unveiled in Manaure, an impoverished city in Colombia’s far north, revolves around Kufu, a new mango-flavored beverage formulated for children. It is part of the industry’s goal of tackling public health through voluntary efforts.

Postobón lauded the drink’s added vitamins and minerals, saying they would “promote cognitive development, strengthen immunity and promote healthy bones,” according to a glowing account of the event published by the newspaper La República, acquired last year by Postobón’s parent company, Organización Ardila Lülle.

Postobón said it would spend $120,000 to evaluate the initiative, which would provide free Kufu each day to thousands of poor children in the region.

The article in La República, however, did not mention one key ingredient: sugar. According to the label on the drink, one juice box of it contains 13 grams of sugar, more than half the daily recommended level for children.

https://movetoamend.org/sugar-industry-withheld-possible-evidence-cancer-link-50-years-ago-researchers-say

November 22, 2017

Teresa Carey

PBS

Scientists at the University of California, San Francisco, said they have uncovered documents demonstrating that members of the sugar industry called off a study, named Project 259, in the 1960s because it linked sucrose — a common sugar — to heart disease and bladder cancer in preliminary experiments.

In 2016, the same researchers discovered a separate, undisclosed document that showed the sugar industry funded a report that downplayed links between sugar and coronary heart disease.

But a trade group argues the sugar industry was always transparent about Project 259 and that it supports science-based evidence even if the results are unfavorable. Here’s a breakdown of what UCSF researchers found.

How the researchers spotted Project 259

UCSF dentist Cristin Kearns started digging into the sugar industry 10 years ago, after representatives at a conference said there is “no scientific consensus” that sugar is linked to chronic illnesses. She combed through library archives across the nation and eventually stumbled across a box containing “confidential” documents on “Project 259.”

In 1968, the Sugar Research Foundation launched a rodent study, which measured the nutritional products of gut bacteria after rats consumed sucrose compared to starch. Project 259’s early results showed that sucrose caused gut microbes to throw off the rodents’ metabolisms, increasing their levels of triglycerides. Triglycerides are fatty molecules, which when elevated, can clog arteries and predispose a person for cardiovascular disease. In a preliminary experiment, Project 259 also found a high-sugar diet boosts the activity of beta-glucuronidase, an enzyme linked to bladder cancer, when compared to a starch diet. The second half of the study, which would have taken a deeper look at starch, was never finished.

After reporting this discovery in August 1970 to the International Sugar Research Foundation, Project 259 scientists requested an additional 12 weeks of funding to continue the research, according to internal documents. One month later, Sugar Research Foundation’s Vice President of Research John Hickson described the value of Project 259 as “nil,” Glantz and Kearns state. The funding request was denied, and the project was abandoned in 1971.

Kearns and UCSF cardiologist Stanton Glantz, who revealed the project’s details in an analysis published Tuesday in PLOS Biology, argue that the sugar industry buried the evidence and stopped funding due to the negative findings.

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http://www.miaminewtimes.com/news/nicolas-maduros-regime-gave-donald-trump-500000-for-inauguration-as-venezuela-starves-9290672

As Venezuela Starves, Maduro's Regime Gave Trump $500K for Inauguration Party

THURSDAY, APRIL 20, 2017 AT 8:54 A.M. BY TIM ELFRINK

Venezuela's dire situation needs no embellishment: Millions are starving. There's hardly any food, no gas, and little medicine. Toilet paper has been scarce for so long that Caracas' airport bathrooms don't even pretend they have any. The dire situation has snowballed into massive protests against President Nicolás Maduro's authoritarian regime, including yesterday's "Mother of All Protests," which brought out hundreds of thousands and left at least three dead.

Amid all of the misery and chaos, $500,000 could go an awfully long way. Think of how many Caracas mothers could feed their families for a month with just a fraction of that sum.

Instead, newly filed federal campaign records show, Maduro's regime gave half a million bucks to Donald Trump to help him throw a party in Washington, D.C. Through the state-owned Citgo Petroleum, Maduro's government dropped that cash to Trump's inaugural committee: one of the largest corporate donations listed on the newly filed federal disclosures.

If it seems odd that a self-branded socialist revolutionary who blames most of his ills on evil American plots would give so much cash to the new U.S. president, it shouldn't. Maduro, though talking tough domestically, has worked hard not to overly antagonize Trump.

SWEET TALK

A HISTORY OF SUGAR

http://backstoryradio.org/shows/sweet-talk/

http://backstoryradio.org/shows/green-acres-2/ hist of US farming

THE ANTI-IMPERIALIST FARMER

Historian Kathleen Mapes (SUNY Sweet Tyranny) talks with Ed and Brian about the anti-imperialist stance of America’s sugar beet farmers at the turn of the 20th Century – one that rested less on idealism than the prominent sugar industries of those new colonial possessions. 1898 span war PI, cuba, and _, so lobby for tariff, but prices fall, bottomed at gt depression, so stop PI import: wanted since 1890, hearings , US beet is future, vs coolie, racist; but guest workers started in ww1, so Mx workers in MI; PI part of US; so lobbied for independence; early 30's PI indep in 10 yrs, restricted imports; wapo editorial "Fake independence" restrict immigration; had priv trade status, s indep risky, so PI legis rejected in 33, but approcved next year hoping for better trade term negot later;

see also soda

also includes artif sweetners

https://gmoanswers.com/about

Supporting partners are organizations, companies and others who are committed to the five core principles of GMO Answers and have added their support to this initiative. To date those partners includeThe American Council on Science and Health, The American Farm Bureau Federation,American Seed Trade Association, American Soybean Association, The American Sugarbeet Growers Association, Minnesota Crop Production Retailers, National Association of Wheat Growers,National Corn Growers Association,National Cotton Council, Ohio AgriBusiness Association, South Dakota Agri-Business Association, The U.S. Beet Sugar Association, Western Sugar

GMO Answers is funded by the members of The Council for Biotechnology Information, which includes BASF, Bayer CropScience, Dow AgroSciences, DuPont,Monsanto Company andSyngenta.

The independent experts who answer consumer questions are not paid by GMO Answers to answer questions. Experts donate their time to answer questions in their area of expertise for the website. They do so because they are passionate about helping the public better understand GMOs and how our food is grown.

On occasion, independent experts participate in speaking or media opportunities on behalf of GMO Answers. In these instances, GMO Answers will reimburse for the travel expenses incurred by the expert.

GLP bs

12/21/2015 Myth busting: There is no such thing as GMO sugar | Genetic Literacy Project

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www.geneticliteracyproject.org

Myth busting: There is no such thing as GMO sugar

Rebecca Larson | December 14, 2015 | Genetic Literacy Project

Roughly 55 percent of the United States

sugar supply is derived from sugar beets,

the remainder from sugarcane. Until

recently, no one really cared about the

source of their sugar, because the end

product, pure sucrose, is identical. What

changed the dialogue was the introduction

of and acceptance of genetically

engineered (GE) sugar beets. Right from

the start and continuing today, antiGMO

organizations have tried their hardest to

scare people about where their sugar is

sourced from:

12/21/2015 Myth busting: There is no such thing as GMO sugar | Genetic Literacy Project

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Those are bizarre claims because sucrose — sugar — whether derived from sugar cane or

sugar beets, contains to DNA. No lab could determine its source. Warnings to consumers to

boycott socalled GMO sugar makes no scientific sense.

Kevin Folta, Chairman of the Horticultural Sciences Department at the University of Florida,

nicely illustrates how all sugar is the same, regardless of source.

This has been proven in the lab. The sugar is free from DNA and protein since it is all chewed

up during the refining process. This has also been proven at the commercial scale. Every sugar

beet processing plant in the U.S. and Canada has been screened by an independent testing

organization and all the sugar was found to be GMOfree.

Other countries freely accept and understand this unique quality of sugar and some, like

Australia, allow sugar derived from GE sugar beets to be labeled as GMOfree since the final

product contains no GE trait.

12/21/2015 Myth busting: There is no such thing as GMO sugar | Genetic Literacy Project

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GE sugar grown in cooperative farms

In a time when many people are interested

in supporting small farms and buying food

locally, it is also sadly ironic that sugar

beets are being so vilified. Most sugar

beets in the U.S. are sourced from grower-owned

cooperatives. Small family farmers

run the whole business from the planting of

the seed to sale of the sugar. Their job has

become increasingly difficult because of

the fear and misinformation related to

contamination and elimination of choice

rooted in activist opposition to GE sugar

beets.

According to Jeffrey Smith, the former yogic flying instructor who runs the oneman NGO

pompously named The Institute for Responsible Technology, GE sugar beets contain

pharmaceutical properties. That’s plain false. There is only one type of GE sugar beet seed:

herbicide tolerant. This sugar beet was genetically engineered by introducing a slightly

modified version of a gene (based on a bacterial sequence) that naturally occurs in all plants.

That precise, minor genetic change has manifested into large environmental benefit for sugar

beet farmers.

Prior to commercial approval of the GE sugar beet, a comprehensive, peer reviewed study

conducted at the University of Reading in Britain concluded that cultivating GE herbicide

tolerant sugar beets is less harmful to the environment and human health than farming

conventional sugar beets.

… global warming, ozone depletion, ecotoxicity of water and acidification and

nutrification of soil and water, were much lower for the herbicidetolerant crop than for

the conventional crop. Emissions contributing to summer smog, toxic particulate matter

and carcinogenicity, which have negative human health impacts, were also substantially

lower for the herbicidetolerant crop.

Since 2009, glyphosate tolerant sugar beets have made up more than 95 percent of the

commercial sugar beet production in the U.S. Over that time, inputs and productivity data

gathered from farmerowned cooperatives show 25 environmental benefits to using GE sugar

beets, ranging from 20 percent higher yields and reduced chemical input, to implementation of

conservation tillage and reduced fossil fuel consumption. The findings highlight the

importance of genetic engineering in the long term sustainability of the farmerowned

industry.

12/21/2015 Myth busting: There is no such thing as GMO sugar | Genetic Literacy Project

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In 2015, the cooperatives submitted a formal report to the National Academy of Sciences as

part of their mission to improve public policy, decision making and public understanding of

science. So when antiGMO ideologues such as Washingtonbased Green America asks

whether sugar beets can be nonGE in the future, the real question should be should sugar

beets be nonGE in the future? With so many benefits to the growers and the planet, my

answer to that question would be a resounding “no”. Nevertheless, all commercial sugar beet

seed companies still actively produce conventional seeds so the U.S. farmers and food

marketers will always have a choice as to whether or not they want to embrace GE technology.

What about cross contamination?

Sugar beets are biennial and do not produce flowers when grown for sugar; the only time

pollen is shed from a sugar beet plant is during seed production. All commercial seed

production for the entire U.S. occurs in Oregon. Sugar beets are close relatives of Swiss chard

and table beets, so they can fertilize each other and they are all present in Oregon.

Upon introduction of GE sugar beets, the sugar beet seed companies recognized the need to

voluntarily implement practices to reduce the risk of unintended pollen flow. They identified

publically where they were located so organic farmers could mind isolation distances, they

increased their minimum isolation distance to greater than twice the Oregon Seed Certification

program mandate, and they moved the GE trait to the female side of the hybrid (the side that

does not produce pollen) so only conventional pollen would be present.

Despite these measures, in 2008, the activist Center for Food Safety backed an Oregon organic

seed producer, Frank Morton, in suing the Federal government over the perceived threat of

contamination. Despite all the uproar, claims of lost business and imminent threat, Morton still

rund a thriving business today. Morton is not alone in overexaggerating risk. As the Genetic

Literacy Project wrote in an article posted in November, “There is no record that any farmer in

the U.S. has ever lost certification as a result of socalled “contamination” — although one

would never know it based on the propaganda on the web.”

12/21/2015 Myth busting: There is no such thing as GMO sugar | Genetic Literacy Project

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When examining the facts behind the fear, the risks associated with biotech beets is minimal.

Although there is an overwhelming scientific consensus on GE crop safety, some are still leery

of consuming foods made with crops grown from GE seeds, but with sugar, the product in the

bag is still GMOfree. Moreover, production farm data has shown that using GE sugar beets to

produce that sugar is friendly for the farmer and our environment.

With solid coexistence strategies among farmers in place, there is little threat that one farmer’s

choice to cultivate GE sugar beets would negatively impact his neighbor’s ability to raise

organic crops. Advocacy groups that encourage consumers to avoid sugar derived from GE

sugar beets really only target small, farmerowned businesses.

Rebecca Larson holds a doctorate in plant pathology and is the proud mother of a

bouncing baby boy. Follow Rebecca at @sugaryfacts.

The following is written by Ben Richardson, based on his new book Sugar [2] (Polity, 2015):

Class, gender, nationality and race structure sugar's unequal production, exchange and consumption across the world. This can be seen most vividly in the corporeal effects of sugar: the new type of chronic kidney disease [3] striking down sugarcane field workers in Central America, the high rate of prostitution and HIV in sugar towns in Zambia, and the disproportionate level of tooth decay [4] among poor and Hispanic children in Colorado, US. The circulation of sugar is also embodied in the landscape with unequal effects on wildlife. Fertilizer run-off from sugar farming has contributed to the degradation of the Great Barrier Reef [5] in Queensland and the destruction of fisheries [6] in the Indus delta (by contrast, the sugarcane plantations have provided welcoming habitats for rats and snakes). Yet these environmental changes are also social. In the case of water pollution, those worst affected have tended to be indigenous people and artisanal fisherfolk traditionally dependent on communal resources for drinking and fishing.

So to really get at the global politics of sugar, the essential question for me was “why does it harm some more than others?”

By starting with social relations, I diverged from two standard approaches. The first of these has addressed the poverty-inducing effects of sugar and framed it as an issue of international trade. This stems from the curious situation whereby exactly the same product, refined sugar, can be made from two entirely different crops. These are the grass crop sugarcane which is grown in tropical climates, and the root crop sugar beet which is grown in temperate climates. The near universal ability to grow these crops has allowed governments across the world to build up a domestic sugar industry by protecting markets from imports and supporting producers with favourable prices.

There are now an estimated 1.1 million jobs in sugar manufacturing [7] and tens of millions more in sugar farming scattered over 120 countries in the world. Moreover, sugar is considered by the World Bank to be the second most protected agricultural commodity in the world behind rice. In 2008 the level of import tariffs and domestic subsidies on sugar accounted for almost one fifth of all agricultural support [8] – that amounts to a lot of redistributive tax!

The injustice that both free traders and development campaigners have pointed out is that protectionist policies seem largely to benefit sugar producers in developed countries. They argue that by keeping out exports from developing countries, trade barriers have denied poor people the chance to trade their way out of poverty and thus confined them to a life of hunger. Or as the Wall Street Journal once pithily put it: “Addiction to sugar subsidies chokes poor nations’ exports [9].”

While trade protection remains important in shaping who benefits from sugar production, the idea that the industry is controlled by wealthy farmers in the European Union (EU) and the US is increasingly untenable. First, significant steps towards liberalisation have happened over the last two decades, turning the EU into a net sugar importer for the first time since the 1970s and opening up the US to unlimited imports from Mexico (whilst sending increased amounts of processed food and High Fructose Corn Syrup the other way). In fact, the US is consistently one of the world’s biggest importers of sugar.

Second, demand for sugar has grown most rapidly in Asia, Africa and Latin America, leading to a steady shift to sugarcane planting in the Global South over the last six decades. Brazil, India, China and Thailand are now the production powerhouses of the global sugar economy.

The third problem with the trade protectionism argument is that they treat countries as homogenous units rather than hierarchical societies. Since there is significant inequality within countries as well as between them focusing on which country sugar is produced in only gives us part of the picture.

There are many examples of men (and they are usually men) in developing countries who have become fantastically wealthy through sugar while their fellow citizens languish in poverty. Two of the richest people the world in fact built their business empires on the back of sugar trading enterprises: the Nigerian Aliko Dangote now worth an estimated $25 billion and the Malaysian Robert Kuok worth $12 billion. Others have found their fortunes as sugar industrialists. The Brazilian Rubens Ometto Silveria Mello, worth $2 billion, made his money at the helm of a sugarcane milling company and was dubbed “the world’s first ethanol billionaire [10]”.

Beyond those agri-businesses selling sugar as an ingredient, there are those re-selling it in the form of manufactured foods and drinks. These include Western-based multinational corporations like Coca-Cola, Hershey’s, Kellogg’s, Mars, Mondelez, Nestlé, PepsiCo and Unilever. Together these companies made over $50 billion profit in 2013; a handsome return for their managers and shareholders. (Did you know that the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, despite its stated goal to improve global health, holds stock in Coca-Cola, Mars, Wal-Mart and Kraft-Heinz [11] worth over a billion dollars?!). These examples of wealth accumulation all belie the idea that we can determine who benefits from sugar simply by looking at national levels of output and export.

The second approach to sugar politics has addressed its adverse health effects. If the injustices of sugar production have been framed as a problem of trade protectionism then those relating to consumption have been framed, quite separately, as a problem of corporate manipulation. These companies are charged with purposefully misleading the public into dangerous eating habits. On the one hand, they manufacture and market foods high in sugar, salt and fat, and on the other hand, lobby governments to water down dietary guidelines and labelling regulations.

Like the literature on trade protectionism though, while it contains some important insights, as a political critique this approach also has its limitations. First, it tends to ignore the countervailing appeal of diets and detoxes popular in the media. Among these are Atkins, Dukan, Glycaemic Index, paleo and No Sugar, all of which have changed the consumption of sugar either by discriminating against sucrose or shifting eating habits away from sweetened foods altogether. Studies which focus only on the dominance of corporations thus miss these forms of (typically feminised) agency and marginalise the response of companies to it. Product reformulation using artificial sweeteners and the takeover of health conscious brands have been particularly common strategies, although by no means a solution to the spread of diet-related disease.

Second, these studies are divorced from issues of production. One of the biggest developments in recent years has been the growth of the ethanol biofuel market. By 2013 fully 15 per cent of global sugarcane production was turned into ethanol; a proportion which is expected to almost double over the next decade. Meanwhile, the masses of corn grown in the US that have been diverted into biofuel production has put inflationary pressure on the price of High Fructose Corn Syrup, making it less competitive compared to sugar [12] in the North American sweetener market. Ignoring these dynamics blinkers us to which agricultural crops end up in our food, in what form, and why.

Third, this account has little to say about the prospects for conscious political change. For example, in his otherwise excellent book Salt, Sugar, Fat: How the Food Giants Hooked Us, the journalist Michael Moss concludes by putting his faith in enlightened shopping to save the day. In his closing paragraph, he argues that:

They [the major food corporations] may have salt, sugar and fat on their side, but, we, ultimately, have the power to make choices. After all, we decide what to buy. We decide how much to eat.

Not only is this is perverse conclusion to reach after spending the previous 346 pages detailing the myriad ways that American consumers have virtually no meaningful choice over what they eat, it also rules out other sources of change and ways of acting. By reducing politics to individual choice at the checkout and starving it of its collective character and varied institutional expression, accounts like the one given by Moss may do more harm than good.

So how should the global politics of sugar be approached instead? My book proceeds from two foundations. The first is that the circulation of sugar is deeply structured by capitalism. Since the 1990s this has been entrenched on a global scale. The North American Free Trade Agreement and the formation of the World Trade Organisation have undermined national farm policy, while the industrialisation of China and marketization of food provisioning across the Global South has underpinned a seismic ‘nutrition transition’. Through these changes and more, the reach and use of sugar has been transformed. As such, a critical analysis of capitalism is necessary not for advocating Communist revolution of the food system (“Eaters of the world, unite. You have nothing to lose but your fast-food chains!”) but to appreciate why this system has led to social inequality and political crisis.

Inequality is reproduced in many ways; from under-paying easily exploitable farm workers like migrants and women, to disproportionately marketing processed sweetened foods to racial minorities and children. Likewise, the over-production of sugar has led to systematic contradictions including periodic market crashes [13] and exacerbating a global diabetes epidemic [14]. These in turn have produced crises (a farm crisis, a health crisis) which state authorities have been called upon to manage. And contrary to the common assertion that equates capitalism with free markets, it is often capitalists themselves have called for state intervention, either to make a market function in their interests or else protect them from the vagaries of it.

At the same time as taking global capitalism seriously, it is also important not to ascribe it with uniform and omnipresent characteristics. Capitalism need not be a single fate. This refers both to the different ways in which capitalist economies can be organised and the limits to which capitalist principles of private property, commodification and endless accumulation extend. Think of the bake-a-cake sales that raise millions for charity. These are just as much part of the economy as a factory making chocolate bars or a futures exchange trading sugar contracts. What this second foundation does then is to create some room for human agency, without which every eventuality would be boiled down to the inner workings of capital – no better than other deterministic accounts of sugar [15] which ascribe everything to its irresistible sweetness or the characteristics of the cane plant.

Progressive political change is not about changing people’s relationship to sugar per se but changing our relationships to one another. Reducing sugar consumption may lower some people’s risk of diabetes, but if those same people remain reliant on poor quality food then it is likely that they will suffer from other forms of diet-related ill-health instead. Similarly, increasing crop productivity through high-yielding seeds may help farmers make a decent living, but only insofar as they are not then subject to price cuts by other businesses in the supply-chain.

I argue that this change comes about through site-specific struggles to value life differently. They are site-specific because they take different forms in different places – a campaign against child advertising here, a protest against water pollution there. But what they have in common is a desire to govern by a different metric, one that recognises values beyond ‘the bottom line’; be it the sanctity of childhood or the preservation of the environment. These contestations might cohere into broader systemic change that would make sugar provisioning more ecologically sound and socially just. This is a move that, I believe, must ultimately challenge the profit-driven organisation of food and farming itself.

http://www.alternet.org/print/personal-health/how-coca-colas-obesity-pr-stunt-blew-companys-face

astroturf

coca-Cola and PepsiCo Agree to Curb Animal Tests

By BRENDA GOODMAN

Published: May 31, 2007

ATLANTA, May 30 — Under pressure from animal rights advocates, two soft drink giants, Coca-Cola and PepsiCo, have agreed to stop directly financing research that uses animals to test or develop their products, except where such testing is required by law.

Researchers at People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals sought the assurances after discovering studies financed by the companies that used animals like rats and chimpanzees to test taste perception and, in some cases, to bolster support for promotional health claims.

PepsiCo said that it would stop directly financing animal experiments, including some it had financed through grants given to graduate students through its Gatorade Sports Science Institute

Elaine Palmer, a spokeswoman for PepsiCo, said that while the company had never supported the idea of animal testing, “We had not been policing it, so that part is new.”

Coca-Cola and PepsiCo are the largest largest manufacturers to agree to the ban.

Coca-Cola also said that it would discontinue a grant given to a researcher at Virginia Commonwealth University who has been studying taste perception in rats, which share certain taste pathways with humans.

Representatives of Coca-Cola and the university declined to say how much financing the company was providing or to elaborate on what the ultimate application of the research might be.

A research associate at PETA, Shalin G. Gala, said, “We see these statements from Coke and Pepsi, massive global conglomerates, as the beginning of the end of all animal tests on food.”

Scientists conducting basic research in animal models have cautioned against PETA’s hard line, saying their work, which may have medical benefits, would not be possible in many cases without help from corporate sponsors.

“It’s very easy to characterize scientific research like this in a bad light,” said Dr. John A. DeSimone, a professor at Virginia Commonwealth University who had been working under the Coca-Cola grant. “To do medical research, you sometimes need an animal model.”

Not everyone agrees with Dr. DeSimone’s thinking, particularly when it involves tests on highly intelligent animals, as did a study involving a Coca-Cola scientist, financed by Nutrasweet, that cut open the faces of chimpanzees to study nerve impulses used in the perception of sweet tastes.

“I have never found chimpanzee work justifiable,” said Dr. Alan Goldberg, director of the Center for Alternatives to Animal Testing at Johns Hopkins University.

Dr. Goldberg said that over the last 30 years, advances in alternatives to animal models, many of which are usually more scientifically precise, have already reduced the number of lab animals in use by 50 percent.

“The bottom line for me is that I’d love to see animal studies disappear entirely,” Dr. Goldberg said. “In vitro models are cleaner.”

The two soft drink giants are the latest companies to respond to scrutiny by PETA, which has mounted a campaign to denounce animal testing practices in the beverage industry, an industry that, unlike cosmetics or pharmaceuticals, had largely been unpublicized in the animal testing arena.

In January, Roll International, the company that makes Pom Wonderful pomegranate juice, agreed to cease tests on animals after PETA disclosed a 2005 study financed by the company that tested the juice to see if it might relieve artificially induced erectile dysfunction in rabbits.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/31/business/31testing.html?_r=0

dominican rep?

astroturf:

he Palm Beach Post‘s Christine Stapleton reports that the “Tea Party” protesters outside of the South Florida Water Management District on Thursday were, by and large, actors hired by the Tea Party of Miami and U.S. Sugar.

The district is currently considering buying land owned by U.S. Sugar, which it would use for the treatment and storage of lake flood water. Environmentalist believe that using the land in this way will allow them to divert more water into the Everglades without harming coastal estuaries. The water would not only help replenish the Everglades, it would also provide an emergency reserve drinking supply for South Florida.

But U.S. Sugar wants to keep the land, arguing that as one of the area’s largest employers, it is in the district’s best interests not to exercise the $350 million buy-out option in its contract. Tea Party Miami:

...

http://www.alternet.org/environment/tea-party-protesters-opposed-florida-land-deal-were-mostly-actors-hired-big-sugar

Time magazine has called them the "First Family of Corporate Welfare"

John Ellis Bush (JEB), Rick Scott, and other GOP politicians kowtow to this family like no other. They were a top donor for W. And they are almost singlehandedly destroying our Everglades.

Welcome to Keeping up with the Fanjul family of Palm Beach. The Fanjul family is synonymous with the term "Big Sugar" here in Florida. They control 1/3 of our nation's raw sugar.

This family collects over 60 million a year in Federal subsidies. As a result, you pay an artificially high price for raw sugar, but of course that's not all. You not only support their hedonistic lifestyle (such as Casa De Campo, their 7000 acre multimillion resort), horrible labor practices, and right-wing politics: you support the killing of our Everglades National Park.

I am not being hyperbolic. The Park is actually going to die, along with Miami's fresh water supply.

One of their subsidiaries is Florida Crystals (among other sugar affiliates). You can see how much of the Everglades that is by itself on the map below. (See the orange and yellow)

That huge lake is Lake Okeechobee, one of the biggest freshwater lakes in the Continental United States. You can pick it out on any map because it is so large. The Fanjul's use this lake to irrigate their crops. The discharge is toxic.

The irrigated water should be recycled in a reservoir, but it isn't. The family dumps it in the coastal estuaries.

Before Tallahassee was taken over by teabags, our state was making an effort to clean up the Everglades. The one crucial piece was a binding contract that the sugar industry signed that would sell land to the state to create a reservoir. Not only that, Florida passed Amendment 1 last year. The whole purpose of that amendment was to guarantee a source of funding for land acquisition to protect Florida's Everglades and our very fragile estuaries.

Despite the GOP's election wave last year, Amendment 1 received 78% of the vote.

Our state has an opportunity to buy the land we need from Big Sugar (the land is shown in the article here), at fair market value. The University of Florida issued a report yesterday to say it's desperately needed. The contract ends on October 15, 2015.

Unfortunately, it isn't going to happen.

Our GOP legislature and, as always, Gov. Sick Scott, are steadfastly refusing to purchase the land we were promised. You see, one big reason the rightwing interests didn't pour money into fighting Amendment 1 is they knew they could just ignore it. Just look at Amendments 5 and 6 back in 2010: they were supposed to end gerrymandering. Didn't happen. They completely ignored those as well, which is why every black neighborhood from Jacksonville to Orlando is crammed into District 5. Because f*** you.

In fact, the only amendment that Pam Bondi and Rick Scott ever fought for was the only one declared illegal by the courts: banning gay marriage.

Rick Scott cares nothing about the Everglades. Heck, he made money allowing fracking in the Everglades before he was caught (and still won re-election). Of course he's not going to care about toxic water.

By the way, if all of this is new to you, I don't blame you. As always, our local media is silent. Also, our state party hasn't said anything. Even though this critical issue is next to our DNC chair's home, Debbie-Wasserman, she hasn't said one word. She is too wrapped up in a failed Senate run.

Please go to SavingFLwater.com and add your name. At the very least, we can let our politicians know that we were watching.

http://www.alternet.org/environment/everglades-be-killed-october-floridas-own-koch-brothers

According to a new report, many scientific studies about nutrition, as well as the trusted experts who disseminate this information to the public, are being funded by the very entities that should be scrutinized.The report, "Nutrition Scientists on the Take from Big Food," details the ways that the world’s largest food corporations—aka Big Food—exert their influence on nutrition research and the people who conduct it.

The report’s author, attorney and food advocate Michele Simon, has previously studied the influence of Big Food on the nation’s largest organization of registered dietitians. Together, these reports paint a scary picture of how food corporations collude to manipulate information in order to increase their profits at the public’s expense. The coyote isn’t just guarding the chicken coop here, it built the coop and kept the only copy of the key.

The new report details how the likes of Coca Cola, Nestle, Hershey’s, Monsanto, Cargill, and many other food giants control what studies get funded and published, steering researchers toward projects that benefit the industry, while silencing research that doesn’t. It focuses on the American Society of Nutrition, which Simon characterized as a trade organization for nutrition scientists when we spoke by phone, though casual readers of the ASN’smission statement might not glean this.

“The American Society for Nutrition (ASN) is a non-profit organization dedicated to bringing together the world's top researchers, clinical nutritionists and industry to advance our knowledge and application of nutrition for the sake of humans and animals.”

The researchers, nutritionists and industries in question are brought together twice a year for ASN’s conventions, where industry sponsors pay big money to get access to nutrition researchers, and even host sessions. While most of the sponsored sessions disclose the corporate funder, the report notes, industry ties are not always so obvious. A recent session, “Sweeteners and Health: Current Understandings, Recent Research Findings and Directions for Future,” was sponsored by the Rippe Lifestyle Institute. The Institute’s founder James Rippe, according to the report, has been paid a $41,000 a month retainer by the Corn Refiners Association, which represents the makers of high fructose corn syrup.

One of the session’s ‘learning objectives” was to “Understand whether or not there is a linkage between sugar consumption and obesity, diabetes and cardiovascular disease as well as other metabolic diseases.” The sugar lobby, “has more than a passing interest” in this matter, the report notes. Rippe has consulted for many other members of the junk food industry as well, including Coca-Cola, Dr. Pepper, McDonald’s, Kraft Foods, General Mills, and Kellogg.

Meanwhile, ASN publishes the one of the most respected scientific journals dedicated to nutrition, the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition(AJCN). Several ASN executives with close ties to industry sit on AJCN’s editorial board, where they help decide what gets published and what doesn’t, Simon told me.

“It’s hard for good nutrition researchers to get funding and published, she said. "That’s why people turn to industry sources. But the ones with too much integrity to take money from industry are facing difficulty and hostility in getting published, because the gatekeepers are on the take from industry. So a lot of good science isn’t getting published. That puts a chill on the research climate in general.”

“People need to understand when they see the latest nutrition science story being reported, it’s always good to question where the funding comes from.”

And when the evidence against a mainstay of Big Food grows to the point where it can’t be contained, the food industry uses platforms like AJCN to confuse the issue, or kick the can down the road a little further with claims that “more research is needed.”

The AJCN has repeatedly propagated the notion that processed foods are being unfairly vilified, and that any time a piece of food is cut, frozen or cooked, it’s by definition processed.

Many processed foods contain added sugars, which have frequently been in the news since the FDA recommended they be noted on the nutrition label as distinct from naturally occurring sugars, which are usually associated with fiber and other nutrients that partially counteract the effects of sugar. Not surprisingly, the American Sugar Association, an ASN sponsor, has come out strongly against the FDA’s recommendation. The ASN has too, couching its true motives behind wording that inaccurately suggests its concern is for consumers’ health.

“This topic is controversial and a lack of consensus remains in the scientific evidence on the health effects of added sugars alone versus sugars as a whole. There is also lack of evidence on the usefulness of a declaration of added sugars on the label to improve food choices and the health of consumers.”

...

http://www.alternet.org/food/whoa-huge-number-nutritional-experts-may-be-bought-big-junk-food-companies

rumy aspertane: http://www.mapcruzin.com/news/rtk092806b.htm

It’s important to further note that, before ACSH stopped revealing donors in 1991, this online source reports that the “Monsanto Fund”was a corporate donor of $25,000 and above. Another donor was “The NutriSweet Company,”which was owned by G.D. Searle & Co., which in turn also funded Enzine-linked STATS. Pfizer, which held the NutriSweet brand, was also a donor to ACSH. This source is called the “Integrity in Science Project.”...

ACSH claims it does not seek donations from corporations or trade groups that are earmarked for specific research projects –in short, there is no quid pro quo. But at Mother Jones reported:

[I]n a March 1992 internal memo obtained by Consumer Reports, Whelan wrote that ACSH staffers would ask the Calorie Control Council, a trade group backed by diet food and drink companies, and McNeil Specialty Products, a Johnson & Johnson subsidiary that owned the US marketing rights to Splenda (an artificial sweetener), for contributions to underwrite the dissemination of a research paper touting artificial sweeteners. (Splenda was then seeking approval for sale in the United States.) [propagandists]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sodium_cyclamate

1985 Adequate data on the carcinogenicity of saccharin and cyclamate to humans are available only for the urinary bladder. In the studies available, exposure to saccharin and to cyclamate cannot be distinguished readily. Descriptive studies have shown no evidence of time trends in bladder cancer that can be related to use of saccharin or cyclamate. Likewise, studies of diabetics, who have used more saccharin and cyclamate than other people, have shown no evidence of an increased risk of bladder cancer. This association, however, is probably confounded negatively by cigarette smoking. Thirteen case-control studies have addressed the relationship of saccharin and cyclamate intake to bladder cancer in individuals. While statistically significant positive associations have been observed, a similar number of significant negative associations has also been observed. Studies of the dose-response relationships have also shown no consistent pattern. Studies of saccharin and cyclamate use with smoking habits have shown no consistent interaction with heavy smoking, as might be expected from a promotional effect. In some studies, however, an increased risk with saccharin and cyclamate use has been observed in female non-smokers--a group otherwise at low risk for bladder cancer.

Michael Sveda, the Inventor Of Cyclamates, Dies at 87

By LESLIE KAUFMAN

Published: August 21, 1999

Dr. Michael Sveda, a chemist who invented cyclamates, a noncaloric sweetener that became widely popular and then was banned by the Government as a possible carcinogen, died on Aug. 10 at his home in Stamford, Conn. He was 87.

The cause was complications from Parkinson's disease, said his wife, Martha Gaeth Sveda.

Dr. Sveda (SVAY-dah) was born on Feb. 3, 1912, in West Ashford, Conn., the son of immigrants from Czechoslovakia.

Dr. Sveda, who once told The New York Times in an interview that ''God looks after damn fools, children and chemists,'' credited providence for his discovery of cyclamates. In 1937, while doing lab work for his doctorate at the University of Illinois, he brushed his lips without having washed his hands and found that his fingers tasted sweet. Intrigued, he tasted chemicals from all the beakers in front of him and discovered the compound that he eventually refined into the sweetener.

By the time Dr. Sveda completed that process, he was an employee of the DuPont Company. He received the patent in 1939, but it was not until 1951 that the Federal Government approved cyclamates as a food additive. Previously, only saccharin had been available as an artificial sweetener, and soon a huge market developed for the alternative product.

By the 1960's cyclamates had become the basis of a $1 billion business in diet soft drinks and desserts. It was an ingredient of the one-calorie soda Tab, for example. Many diabetics wrote Dr. Sveda to thank him for the growth of options in sweets available to them.

In his 20 years at DuPont, Dr. Sveda worked on several other patents, making contributions to such diverse compounds as the pesticide DDT, nylon and mustard gas, but it was the sweetener that held the broadest public interest.

In 1969, however, the Department of Health, Education and Welfare banned cyclamates from the market on the risk that the substance caused cancer. The decision was based on experiments that showed that some rats that were fed large quantities over their life spans developed bladder tumors. Although Dr. Sveda said he was not embittered by the Government's decision, he contended that the experiments had not been rigorous enough to warrant the ban. In subsequent interviews, he even suggested that the sugar industry had used its political muscle to squelch a competitor.

''My father would have been the first person to say, 'If this is harmful don't use it,' '' said his daughter, Sally Sveda, of Newton Falls, Mass. ''But he felt that it was important to be accurate in the science since there were many people who might benefit from it, especially diabetics.''

After the Government acted, Dr. Sveda received phone calls from people worried that they had been poisoned by the cyclamates, a development he found frightening.

In fact, further Government studies contradicted the findings behind the ban. In one, by the National Cancer Institute, a group of monkeys were fed doses of the chemical equivalent to drinking 30 cans of artificially sweetened soda a day for 17 years, with no unusual sign of illness.

To this day, however, the Food and Drug Administration has not cleared the substance for consumption in this country again, even though it is used in products in other nations.

In 1981, the Government classified saccharin as a suspected carcinogen but did not ban it. An advisory group recommended last year that it be given a clean bill of health.

After he left DuPont, Dr. Sveda worked as a consultant on management techniques. In addition to his wife and daughter, he is survived by a son, Michael, of Washington, and a granddaughter.

http://www.propublica.org/article/sugar-plant-removed-safety-device-13-days-before-temp-workers-death

tom scanlon in spy PR of damned

http://books.google.ca/books?id=qnVC8yS4N_AC&lpg=PP1&rview=1&pg=PA90#v=onepage&q&f=false

===

he latest Oxfam video campaign has taken aim at the biggest giants in the sugar industry, accusing them of massive land grabs and the displacement of poor farmers across the world.

“The companies that supply your favorite food brands with sugar may be kicking poor farmers off their lands and out of their homes...Tell Coca-Cola, Pepsi Co and Associated British Foods to make sure their sugar doesn’t lead to land grabs," demands Oxfam in the new video.

The culprits -- Coca-Cola, Pepsi Co. and Associated British Foods -- are combined known as "the Big Three." At least one member of the trio has taken notice of the viral video campaign: Coke recently declared that it would make sure its sugar production doesn't lead to land grabs.

Now that Coke has taken action, the focus has shifted to rival Pepsi with campaigners urging the giant corporation to commit to zero tolerance for land grabs ahead of their shareholder-filing deadline.

http://grist.org/news/u-s-government-is-buying-up-300-million-sugar-glut/

ATF high price sugar elininating bootlegging (NRA did not want elim or go to secret service)

b2 farm bill? : green drink water pgm hijacked to expand feedlots; helped sugar too? jeb everglade plans shifted cleanup burden to us 112

The Sugar Association, headquartered in Washington, D.C., states that its mission "is to promote the consumption of sugar as part of a healthy diet and lifestyle through the use of sound science and research."^[1] It engages in public relations on behalf of its member companies, encouraging the use of sugar. Member companies consist of sugar producers in the U.S.^[2]

Contents [hide]

Nutritional issues

The Sugar Association maintains that sugar is an essential and healthy part of the diet and says that sugars are not "uniquely fattening." The Association's website says, "Nutrition experts consistently recommend increasing carbohydrates to achieve a healthful diet."^[3]

Member companies

The Amalgamated Sugar Company
American Crystal Sugar Company
American Sugar Cane League
American Sugar Refining, Inc.
C&H Sugar Company, Inc.
Hawaiian Sugar & Transportation Cooperative
Michigan Sugar Company
Minn-Dak Farmers Cooperative
Okeelanta Corporation
Osceola Farms Company
Rio Grande Valley Sugar Growers, Inc.
Southern Minnesota Beet Sugar Cooperative
Sugar Cane Growers Cooperative of Florida
United States Sugar Corporation^[4]

Work

In 2003, the sugar industry in the U.S. was threatening to have U.S. government funding of the World Health Organization (WHO) cut off because WHO was saying that no more than 10% of a person's daily calories should come from sugar. CBS News wrote, "An effort to get an increasingly flabby world to stop eating so much sugar ran head-on into the U.S. sugar lobby, which claims the dangers of the sweet stuff are being overstated. People should get no more than 10 percent of their daily calories from sugar and other high-calorie sweeteners, the World Health Organization will recommend in a report on Wednesday.

"That guideline is among several in WHO's attempt at a global strategy on health aimed at preventing such threats as heart disease, obesity, cancer and diabetes. It was immediately attacked by the Sugar Association, which represents U.S. growers and refiners." ^[5]

Sarah Boseley of the Guardian wrote about the threat to cut off funding, "The threat is being described by WHO insiders as tantamount to blackmail and worse than any pressure exerted by the tobacco lobby. The association, together with six other big food industry groups, has also written to the US health secretary, Tommy Thompson, asking him to use his influence to get the WHO report withdrawn. The coalition includes the US Council for International Business, comprising more than 300 companies, including Coca-Cola and Pepsico. ^[6]

Advertising

As an example of advertising to increase sales, AG Weekly (Agricultural Weekly) of Twin Falls, Idaho wrote, "The Sugar Association is just finishing a $4 million advertising campaign in nine major urban areas to promote sugar, said Andrew Briscoe, association president and chief executive. The campaign, which received voluntary funding from Amalgamated Sugar Co. in Boise and five other sugar companies, started in September. The effort will run through January in one remaining city." ^[7]

The sugar industry's image has been tarnished because of concerns in the U.S. about obesity. On March 20, 2005, the U.S. News & World Report wrote about another $3 million to $4 million ad campaign funded by sugar beet growers, "After several decades of declining sales--much of it lost to cheaper high-fructose corn syrup--the industry felt it needed to "reintroduce the consumer to sugar," says Melanie Miller, a spokeswoman for the Sugar Association."

The magazine article talked about the effects of sugar, "A study published last year in the Journal of the American Medical Association found that women who drank soda pop or other sweet drinks were more likely to gain weight and had a higher risk for diabetes than other women. Another study, in the Journal of Adolescent Health, found that children who ate some types of sweet foods--candy, soda pop, and sweet bakery goods--were less likely to get all their recommended vitamins than other children. Last year, for the first time, a government committee linked sugar-sweetened beverages to obesity. Then in January, guidelines from the Departments of Agriculture and Health and Human Services made recommendations for sugar consumption stricter than ever before." ^[8]

Personnel

Staff: ^[9]

Andrew Briscoe, Chief Executive Officer
Charles Baker, Chief Science Officer
Cheryl Digges, Vice President of Public Policy and Education
Melanie Miller, Vice President of Public Relations
Eric Wheeler, Vice President, Finance and Administration

Board members: ^[10]

Charles Bauer, American Sugarbeet Growers Association
Steve Bearden, Rio Grande Valley Sugar Growers, Inc.
David Berg, American Crystal Sugar Company
Andrew Briscoe, The Sugar Association, Inc.
Don Carson, Atlantic Sugar Association
Robert Coker, United States Sugar Corporation
Mark Duffin, American Sugarbeet Growers Association
Pepe Fanjul, Jr., American Sugar Refining, Inc., C&H Sugar Company
Mark Flegenheimer, Michigan Sugar Company
David Goodlett, Sugar Cane Growers Cooperative of Florida
Alan Kennett, Hawaiian Sugar & Transportation Cooperative
Darren Luft, American Sugarbeet Growers Association
Greg Nolan, American Sugar Cane League
John Richmond, Southern Minnesota Beet Sugar Cooperative
David Roche, Minn-Dak Farmers Cooperative
Parks Shackelford, Okeelanta Corporation
James Simon, American Sugar Cane League
Bill Smith, The Amalgamated Sugar Company
Kelvin Thompsen, Spreckels Sugar Company
Steve Williams, American Sugarbeet Growers Association

Contact details

1300 L Street, NW, Suite 1001

Washington, D.C. 20005

Phone: (202) 785-1122

Fax: (202) 785-5019

Email: sugar AT sugar.org

Web: http://www.sugar.org

Resources

SourceWatch resources

References

↑ About page, Sugar Association, accessed May 2008.
↑ Press releases, Sugar Association, accessed May 2008
↑ Sugar Association Balanced Diet, organizational website, accessed December 14, 2011
↑ Member companies, Sugar Association, accessed May 2008.
↑ "Sugar Lobbyists Sour On Study", CBS News, April 23, 2003.
↑ Sarah Boseley, "Sugar Industry Threatens to Scupper WHO", CommonDreams.org/Guardian, April 21, 2003.
↑ Scott Kraus, "Sugar Association to wrap up ad campaign", AG Weekly, February 8, 2007.
↑ Elizabeth Querna, "No, it's not just your sweet tooth", U.S. News & World Report, March 20, 2005.
↑ Staff, Sugar Association, accessed May 2008.
↑ Board members, Sugar Association, accessed May 2008.

Categories:

http://grist.org/news/big-sugar-could-get-a-big-government-bailout/

UN probes sugar industry claims

A United Nations agency has launched an investigation into claims that a key consultation into how much sugar we should be eating was secretly funded by the sugar industry.

The BBC's Panorama programme has uncovered documents which reveal the World Sugar Research Organisation and International Life Sciences Institute, both funded by the sugar industry, helped pay for the Expert Consultation on Carbohydrates in Human Nutrition.

The programme also reveals that ISLI was given the opportunity to suggest members of the committee and select the chairman, as well as review the agenda of the consultation.

“ I believe that it would be impossible to produce an unbiased report when the source of funding came from groups with clearly vested interests.”

Professor Jim Mann

Committee member

Since its publication the report of the consultation has been used by the sugar lobby to fight any suggestion of a link between sugar and health concerns.

Now the UN's Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) has said it plans to reconvene the research committee "urgently".

'Impartiality doubts'

The expert consultation was a joint venture between the World Health Organisation (WHO) and the FAO and was due to look impartially at key questions, including whether sugar is detrimental to human health.

But Jim Mann - a highly respected nutritionist from New Zealand - told the programme he always had doubts about the consultation's independence.

He said: "When we arrived some of us were summoned by one of the officials who was involved in the organisation of the consultation and told very clearly that it would be inappropriate us to say anything bad about sugar in relation to human health."

Another of the team invited to Rome sensed that the science might not be the only driving force.

Professor John Cummings claims that a chairman had already been chosen before the committee began its work.

He also claimed that one official - there as an observer - obstructed the debate when sugar was being discussed.

He added: "I was very surprised when he sort of came immediately to the defence of sugar during the consultation. I couldn't really understand why he did because normally these officials sit and listen and just sort of prod you when they think something needs doing but this was quite amazing."

Funding documents

The experts didn't know that the sugar industry was paying for them to be in Rome.

But Panorama has discovered a series of documents which show exactly where the money came from.

It shows that the World Sugar Research Organisation - funded by the sugar industry paid US$20,000 towards the consultation.

ILSI - the International Life Sciences Institute - an American research group paid for by food companies like Coca Cola and Tate and Lyle also put in US$40,000.

Panorama reveals that ILSI was also invited to suggest who might sit on the consultation and even nominated the chairman months before the experts ever came to Rome.

This funding deal was agreed with the FAO's then Director of Food and Nutrition, John Lupien.

'Surprise revelation'

This news came as a surprise to the committee members that Panorama spoke to, none of whom had any idea that the research had been funded by the sugar industry.

Professor Mann, said: "My guess would be that I certainly and probably my colleagues would not have been prepared to be involved with such an activity had it been funded by these organisations.

"I believe that it would be impossible to produce an unbiased report when the source of funding came from groups with clearly vested interests."

“ If the funding was accepted together with influence of the choice of experts or of the wording of the report then it is unacceptable”

Hartwig de Haen

FAO assistant director general

But another shocking fact was to come out of the committee discussion.

The experts Panorama spoke to claim they had agreed on a limit of between 55 and 75% on how much carbohydrate we should eat. But when the report came out the upper limit had gone.

Professor Mann complained that a report which failed to mention a limit on carbohydrate - or on sugar - was open to abuse.

He added: "I think it would clearly be to the advantage of the industry not to have an upper limit, because increasingly the industry are producing food products which are reduced in fat, and one way of compensating for fat is to increase the amount of sugar.

"So obviously if there's no upper limit of sugar, one can add sugar with impunity into a whole range of food products."

The FAO's Assistant Director General, Hartwig de Haen, was also surprised at Panorama's revelations.

"If the funding was accepted together with influence of the choice of experts or of the wording of the report then it is unacceptable, that is true," he said.

'Misinterpreted recommendations'

A statement from the FAO confirmed that the ISLI and the WSRO were asked to propose names of experts for the consultation but that the FAO had the final say.

It went on to say that the lack of rigid guidelines meant the consultation was not illegal but "did contravene common sense norms of transparency and the avoidance of perceived conflict of interest."

“ We see no reason why ILSI's partial support of the consultation or our participation in the process would call into question the credibility of the consultation”

ILSI statement

The FAO said the sugar lobby had misquoted and misinterpreted the recommendations of the 1998 study.

It added that the WHO has been working on reconvening a Carbohydrates consultation, and that this matter was now "regarded as urgent".

ILSI also said it only suggested names of experts to be on the committee, adding: "We did not suggest a specific person as the Chair; it is our understanding that decision is made by the experts themselves.

"We see no reason why ILSI's partial support of the consultation or our participation in the process would call into question the credibility of the consultation."

John Lupien, contradicted Mr de Haen and said that it was normal practice to seek outside funding for studies, adding: "The sources of these funds were not made known to the experts, and were not acknowledged in the final report since this was routine FAO/WHO practice."

He added that the experts had approved the draft agenda and elected Professor David Lineback as their Chairman.

Panorama: The Trouble With Sugar was broadcast on BBC One on Sunday, 10 October at 22:15 BST

CSE's Florida operations exemplify its activism.

CSE took in the sugar industry contributions--$280,000 each from U.S. Sugar Corp. and Florida Crystals Corp., and $140,000 from the Sugar Cane Growers Cooperative of Florida--from October to December 1998. That November, CSE Foundation issued a news release asserting that the Everglades project would cost $120 per household in Florida and could result in the loss of 2,879 jobs. The foundation also released a poll concluding that the vast majority of Floridians did not support tax hikes to finance the project.

Describing CSE as the "voice of consumers for free enterprise," CSE representatives in polo shirts with the CSE logo showed up at a series of local hearings on the plan. And in early 1999, CSE Foundation unveiled a study charging that a peer review panel appointed by Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt lacked objectivity.

Meanwhile, sugar industry representatives kept a low profile, asserting publicly that, in principle, they supported the restoration plan. The Florida legislature approved a revised version of it last year, but hurdles remain, including congressional funding. The companies said they did not renew their contributions to CSE in 1999 because CSE's outspoken criticism no longer reflected their position.

CSE officials, emphasizing their group's independence, noted that, on a separate issue, CSE's opposition to sugar import quotas is sharply at odds with the domestic sugar industry. But U.S. Sugar Corp. spokesman Robert Buker noted that CSE "has not been in the front row of the debate" over import quotas since it received industry funding. "We had a good dialogue with them," he added.

The Everglades has been just one of CSE's Florida projects. Jon L. Shebel, president and chief executive of Associated Industries of Florida, representing 10,000 businesses, credits CSE with helping enact the broad tort reform last year that was business's top priority in the state.

"They've made a difference in Florida," said Shebel. "We had a major war going on with the trial lawyers. At times [CSE] would take the TV, and we would take the radio. They have access to big dollars that we don't have access to. . . . It's added a new dimension."

Think Tanks: Corporations' Quiet Weapon

By Dan Morgan

Washington Post Staff Writer

Saturday, January 29, 2000; Page A1

C<ul style="line-height: 1.5em; margin: 0.3em 0px 0.5em 1.6em; padding: 0px; list-style-image: url(data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAAUAAAANAQMAAABb8jbLAAAABlBMVEX///8AUow5QSOjAAAAAXRSTlMAQObYZgAAABNJREFUCB1jYEABBQw/wLCAgQEAGpIDyT0IVcsAAAAASUVORK5CYII=);"><li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Center_for_Consumer_Freedom" title="Center for Consumer Freedom" style="text-decoration: none; background: none;">Center for Consumer Freedom</a></li><li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Corn_Sugar" title="Corn Sugar" style="text-decoration: none; background: none;">Corn Sugar</a></li></ul>

E<ul style="line-height: 1.5em; margin: 0.3em 0px 0.5em 1.6em; padding: 0px; list-style-image: url(data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAAUAAAANAQMAAABb8jbLAAAABlBMVEX///8AUow5QSOjAAAAAXRSTlMAQObYZgAAABNJREFUCB1jYEABBQw/wLCAgQEAGpIDyT0IVcsAAAAASUVORK5CYII=);"><li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Enterprise_Freedom_Action_Committee" title="Enterprise Freedom Action Committee" style="text-decoration: none; background: none;">Enterprise Freedom Action Committee</a></li></ul>

F<ul style="line-height: 1.5em; margin: 0.3em 0px 0.5em 1.6em; padding: 0px; list-style-image: url(data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAAUAAAANAQMAAABb8jbLAAAABlBMVEX///8AUow5QSOjAAAAAXRSTlMAQObYZgAAABNJREFUCB1jYEABBQw/wLCAgQEAGpIDyT0IVcsAAAAASUVORK5CYII=);"><li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Frederick_J._Stare" title="Frederick J. Stare" style="text-decoration: none; background: none;">Frederick J. Stare</a></li></ul>

F cont.<ul style="line-height: 1.5em; margin: 0.3em 0px 0.5em 1.6em; padding: 0px; list-style-image: url(data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAAUAAAANAQMAAABb8jbLAAAABlBMVEX///8AUow5QSOjAAAAAXRSTlMAQObYZgAAABNJREFUCB1jYEABBQw/wLCAgQEAGpIDyT0IVcsAAAAASUVORK5CYII=);"><li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Fructose" title="Fructose" style="text-decoration: none; background: none;">Fructose</a></li></ul>

I<ul style="line-height: 1.5em; margin: 0.3em 0px 0.5em 1.6em; padding: 0px; list-style-image: url(data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAAUAAAANAQMAAABb8jbLAAAABlBMVEX///8AUow5QSOjAAAAAXRSTlMAQObYZgAAABNJREFUCB1jYEABBQw/wLCAgQEAGpIDyT0IVcsAAAAASUVORK5CYII=);"><li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/International_Food_Information_Council" title="International Food Information Council" style="text-decoration: none; background: none;">International Food Information Council</a></li></ul>

R<ul style="line-height: 1.5em; margin: 0.3em 0px 0.5em 1.6em; padding: 0px; list-style-image: url(data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAAUAAAANAQMAAABb8jbLAAAABlBMVEX///8AUow5QSOjAAAAAXRSTlMAQObYZgAAABNJREFUCB1jYEABBQw/wLCAgQEAGpIDyT0IVcsAAAAASUVORK5CYII=);"><li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Robert_Casad_Hockett" title="Robert Casad Hockett" style="text-decoration: none; background: none;">Robert Casad Hockett</a></li></ul>

S<ul style="line-height: 1.5em; margin: 0.3em 0px 0.5em 1.6em; padding: 0px; list-style-image: url(data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAAUAAAANAQMAAABb8jbLAAAABlBMVEX///8AUow5QSOjAAAAAXRSTlMAQObYZgAAABNJREFUCB1jYEABBQw/wLCAgQEAGpIDyT0IVcsAAAAASUVORK5CYII=);"><li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Sucrose" title="Sucrose" style="text-decoration: none; background: none;">Sucrose</a></li></ul>

S cont.<ul style="line-height: 1.5em; margin: 0.3em 0px 0.5em 1.6em; padding: 0px; list-style-image: url(data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAAUAAAANAQMAAABb8jbLAAAABlBMVEX///8AUow5QSOjAAAAAXRSTlMAQObYZgAAABNJREFUCB1jYEABBQw/wLCAgQEAGpIDyT0IVcsAAAAASUVORK5CYII=);"><li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Sugar" title="Sugar" style="text-decoration: none; background: none;">Sugar</a></li><li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Sugar_Association" title="Sugar Association" style="text-decoration: none; background: none;">Sugar Association</a></li><li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Sugar_Research_Foundation,_Inc." title="Sugar Research Foundation, Inc." style="text-decoration: none; background: none;">Sugar Rese</a></li></ul>

Sugar /sweetner

Experts: Non-GMO Certification of GMO-Derived Sweetener Sets a 'Dangerous Precedent'

SWEET TALK

A HISTORY OF SUGAR

THE ANTI-IMPERIALIST FARMER

Nutritional issues

Member companies

Work

Advertising

Personnel

Contact details

Resources

SourceWatch resources

References

Think Tanks: Corporations' Quiet Weapon

Attachments