Education or exploitation?
Trans fats are the latest food story to hit the headlines. Cereal bars and biscuits are in the spotlight as consumers learn of the dangers associated with eating these body-damaging fatty acids. Meanwhile, memories of other scare stories -- toxic dioxins in salmon, beef DNA in chicken products and, the biggest of them all, BSE -- linger in the public psyche.
Not surprisingly, the Food Standards Agency (FSA) 2004 report, Consumer attitudes to food standards, found that nearly 70% of consumers are very to quite concerned about food safety issues.
But why has the number of scares and scandals risen so dramatically in recent years? Intensive farming methods have led to a rise in problems resulting from those methods and more fastidious public health initiatives have led to increased awareness. And the media has, of course, played an important role in bringing potential food fears to light.
Negative media attention has a very real effect on sales. Sales of prawns fell when newspapers warned of 'Natural prawn killers' (The Sun, March 2002), after these crustaceans were found to contain the illegal drug nitrofurans. Recent headlines such as 'Scottish farmed salmon full of cancer toxins' (Daily Telegraph, Jan 2004) have sent shockwaves through the food producing and retail industries.
Sales of tuna also plummeted after press reports stated the fish contained dangerously high levels of mercury. This in spite of the fact the FSA stressed the average consumption of mercury through fish in the UK was lower than guidelines set by the World Health Organisation.
Good Housekeeping's November 2004 salt article backs up the FSA's campaign to cut consumption, highlighting the real concerns, as well as suggesting viable ways of cutting down. Faced with the facts and a practical way of responding to those facts, the effect is reassuring rather than scaremongering.
Otherwise, there's a real danger the media will become the 'boy who cried wolf'. The public will become anaesthetised to sensationalised stories to the point where, when a real scare comes along, they might not react at all.
Joanne Finney
is a food writer at Good Housekeeping Magazine,
