[HN Gopher] How Nestle gets children hooked on sugar in lower-in...
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How Nestle gets children hooked on sugar in lower-income countries
Author : henriquenunez
Score : 224 points
Date : 2024-04-17 17:18 UTC (5 hours ago)
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| barrenko wrote:
| Lower income gets kids hooked on sugar.
| gonzalj3 wrote:
| on* sugar
| barrenko wrote:
| ^ thanks
| slothtrop wrote:
| If that were true you'd expect this replicated in everywhere.
| stuff4ben wrote:
| It is in the US. Ever hear of food deserts?
| Tade0 wrote:
| It is. Low household income correlates with obesity.
| olliej wrote:
| Yeah, there's a real failure to understand that sugar and junk
| food while unhealthy in the long term remains the most cost
| effective source of _calories_.
|
| Having little money doesn't mean your kids don't magically need
| fewer calories (and not providing those calories is itself a
| crime), so if you have an affordable source of calories that's
| what you go for, even if those calories come with a side
| helping of excess calories (stopping hunger requires volume of
| food so high calorie/volume ratio results in over eating), and
| often huge amounts of fat as well.
|
| I grew up dirt poor in the early 80s in NZ, and the cheapest
| food then was oatmeal and dried spaghetti, but by the 90s the
| time people were having to work and the amount being paid for
| that work and rent, _and_ the super steep drop in price of
| McDonald's etc (it went from being an expensive birthday treat
| when I was a kid to being cheaper than fish &chips) means that
| the diet switch was likely unavoidable.
|
| Luckily for me by that point my parents had been able to start
| working, so fridge and weekly shopping was an option (bread
| wouldn't go stale, we could keep meat and vegetables in a
| freezer), but I can't imagine having the same outcome if my
| families life was shifted ten years later (much higher student
| loans, even less money while they were students, most non junk
| food being more expensive while junk food was cheaper).
|
| I recognize 80s NZ poverty is not US poverty, but even in NZ I
| can't imagine how much harder life would be for a similarly
| (economically) placed family is today vs for me, everything
| seems tailored to create obesity and struggles.
| WarOnPrivacy wrote:
| > Yeah, there's a real failure to understand that sugar and
| junk ... remains the most cost effective source of calories.
|
| This is usually the point where someone interjects some
| examples of cheap foods that poor people ought to just buy -
| because everyone, everywhere has trivial access to their
| middle class shopping experience.
|
| But even past that: Being poor also means subject to
| ceaseless Denial of Resources Attacks. Resources here meaning
| funds, attention, energy, ability, hope, will and anything
| one needs to raise one's station.
|
| Hacking a meal plan struggles to rise to the top of a
| priority stack when one has dozens of problems in a critical
| state. And because of poverty, it requires 10x the steps to
| solve those issues than non-poor people face.
|
| source: decade of hunger-level poverty with kids
| olliej wrote:
| Nestle is a truly awful company, and their CEO has historically
| been a terrible human being, but... this isn't a nestle specific
| activity? As far as I can tell this is standard behaviour from
| every company involved in snack foods, candy, soda, etc? And they
| go to great lengths to to hide that's what they're doing - most
| of the "juice" you can buy at US stores are essentially just soda
| minus the bubbles, growing up in NZ a huge part of childhood was
| flavored milk (many more and better flavors than in the US - lime
| was my favorite :) ) than in the US, but those all had absurd
| amounts of sugar as well, despite being advertised/pushed as
| healthy milk products for children (I still love them all and try
| to pretend they're not functionally soda when they're available).
| dumbfounder wrote:
| I think the point is that the offer products that cover a
| significant portion of the market throughout your entire life,
| so they are highly incentivized to act in such a way to get you
| to consume sugary products (theirs) as much as possible.
|
| I haven't seen anyone proposing reasons why these added sugars
| might be beneficial. Is there a counterargument? Are these
| countries where calories are very hard to come by, and thus
| they make the case that they are helping deliver those calories
| cheaply?
| nemomarx wrote:
| There's some specific things they're doing, like adding sugar
| to infant formula and milk, that they don't do in Europe but do
| in lower income countries apparently. That seems like a very
| conscious thing targeted at very young children?
| filleduchaos wrote:
| > this isn't a nestle specific activity? As far as I can tell
| this is standard behaviour from every company involved in snack
| foods, candy, soda, etc?
|
| If you open the article, you might discover that this is about
| _literal baby food_ for infants as young as six months, not
| snacks and such for [older] children.
| olliej wrote:
| Sorry I didn't include that as well, but it's the same
| category of "cheap high calorie", and nestle is still not
| alone in that. That's most cheap baby formula producers
| mesarvagya wrote:
| Obligatory r/fucknestle.
|
| Nestle has a long history of doing lots of fucked up things. I
| try to use as few Nestle products as possible. I don't get why
| government can't regulate these companies which has a monopoly on
| everything you eat or drink[1]
|
| [1] https://wyomingllcattorney.com/images/nestle-list.png
| Lio wrote:
| It's depressing as hell that a company like Nestle was allowed
| to buy a company like Roundtree.
|
| It's a reminder that no matter what a company's founder's
| principles are as soon as it goes public it's a target to have
| all that reversed by people with no principles at all.
|
| At least Roundtree's foundation survives.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Rowntree_Foundation
| Anthony-G wrote:
| Upvoted your comment because it's so true. The Quakers have a
| great tradition of setting up ethical enterprises. I mostly
| know Rowntree because of the chocolate but I also remember
| the family came to Ireland during the Great Famine to provide
| relief to the victims of racist British "laissez faire"
| economics.
|
| By the way, the name is spelled "Rowntree" (I also used to
| think the first syllable was "round").
| tptacek wrote:
| In what sense does Nestle have a monopoly on everything you eat
| or drink?
| throwaway290 wrote:
| GP exaggerated but I have experiences looking say for a
| bottle of water or ice cream cone that is not Nestle and
| failing (not in US)
| tptacek wrote:
| You can just Google "ice cream brands market share" and
| learn that Nestle has nothing resembling a monopoly on ice
| cream. The 5 top brand owners _combined_ represent less
| than 1 /3 of the market.
| ikekkdcjkfke wrote:
| Because we operate on a banlist instead of an allowlist of
| ingredients. Banned sugar in baby porridge? Oh, we just broke
| down the wheat (to simpler carbs/high insulin response)
| hombre_fatal wrote:
| So, they own a lot of packaged food brands?
|
| Only my cat regularly consumes anything on that list.
| timeon wrote:
| Not even my cat.
| sebmellen wrote:
| It's hard to imagine a more evil company.
|
| [0]: https://youtu.be/MRWWK-iW_zU
|
| [1]: https://www.zmescience.com/feature-post/culture/culture-
| soci...
| nickff wrote:
| I'm not a Nestle fan, but I'm not sure they're evil and they're
| nowhere close to the most evil company. One well-documented
| prime example would be Krupp:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Arms_of_Krupp
| margalabargala wrote:
| They're up there for most evil currently-extant Western
| company. Certainly near the top for most evil company that a
| median HN user might directly interact with the products of
| (unlike, say, arms manufacturers).
|
| I would argue they are much more evil than any oil company.
| tstrimple wrote:
| > Certainly near the top for most evil company that a
| median HN user might directly buy the product of.
|
| And a lot of folks don't really know just how many bands
| Nestle owns.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Nestl%C3%A9_brands
|
| They have over 50 brands of water alone. Avoiding their
| products requires home work and diligence.
| timeon wrote:
| Seems like it is mostly junk-food. Not hard to avoid.
| nickff wrote:
| I think many people interact with Krupp's modern
| incarnation on a very regular basis; ThyssenKrupp is one of
| the largest manufacturers of elevators in the world.
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ThyssenKrupp
| margalabargala wrote:
| Based on the "Controversies" section on that wikipedia
| page, it does not appear that the modern incarnation is
| particularly evil.
|
| The current incarnation of the East India Company is also
| not particularly evil, despite the many evils done
| centuries ago: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-south-
| asia-10971109
| mrguyorama wrote:
| Making weapons of war is a kind of banal evil that most
| people can wrap their heads around.
|
| Nestle spent enormous effort purposely convincing
| impoverished mothers in third world countries to spend their
| little money on Nestle infant formula despite knowing 1) The
| mothers would not be able to get clean water to make the
| formula with 2) would not be able to properly refrigerate
| unused but already mixed formula, which is a foodborne
| illness time bomb 3) that the mothers could not afford enough
| formula to adequately feed their infants, and the infants
| would be malnourished as a result
|
| And they did this while trying to convince people formula was
| "healthier", while they knew that to be untrue.
|
| When an infant formula company poisoned some kids in China
| meanwhile, some company execs literally got the death
| penalty.
| margalabargala wrote:
| > When an infant formula company poisoned some kids in
| China meanwhile, some company execs literally got the death
| penalty.
|
| The melamine tainted milk was purchased and used
| by...Nestle.
|
| https://abc7chicago.com/archive/6405382/
| nickff wrote:
| If you read the Wiki, you'll see that weapon's
| manufacturing is nowhere near the worst thing Krupp did.
| Krupp used Jewish slave labor during WWII, and treated the
| slaves so badly that the SS criticized them for it.
| dfxm12 wrote:
| Tangentially related, but I take a look at the amount of sugar in
| a regular cola (39g of added sugar in a 12oz can of Coke!!), and
| I wonder how much damage that has done to my body (and taste
| buds) over the years (let alone society as a whole). I always
| wondered what a Coke with just half the sugar would taste like. I
| think I would enjoy it. Well, recently, my grocery store has been
| stocking De la Calle Tepache. It's not cola, but still, it's a
| carbonated soft drink with just 8g of sugar in a 12 oz can. It's
| got less than a quarter of the sugar of Coke and it's still
| plenty sweet!
|
| How many people could have avoided diabetes or other health
| problems if coca-cola just set the standard that 8g of sugar is
| enough?
| windowsrookie wrote:
| Looking at the ingredients of "De la Calle Tepache" it contains
| ERYTHRITOL, which is a sugar alcohol/artificial sweetener but
| does not count as "sugar" on the nutrition facts label. This is
| why it tastes "plenty sweet".
|
| So similar to Coke Zero/Diet Coke.
| jbandela1 wrote:
| And Erythritol is linked to heart attacks and strokes via
| enhanced platelet activity.
|
| https://www.nature.com/articles/s41591-023-02223-9
| vector_spaces wrote:
| It's not correct to say that it's an artificial sweetener --
| not all non-caloric sweeteners are artificial, and not all
| processed additives are synthetic. That is to say, erythritol
| occurs in the environment in all kinds of settings, where
| e.g. sucralose is artificial because it needs to be
| synthesized by humans in a laboratory.
|
| To be clear, that is the only sense in which I distinguish
| artificial/synthetic and natural substances -- those words
| are heavily loaded now and carry with them all kinds of
| connotations to the point of not even being particularly
| useful, but if we're going to use them we should at least be
| correct!
| mattbee wrote:
| Whoa, in the UK they changed Coca Cola to contain "only" 11.4g
| carbohydrates. I think that was a response to the Soft Drinks
| Industry Levy of 2018. To me it tastes the same but without the
| stickiness that made me want to brush my teeth immediately
| afterwards.
| mungoman2 wrote:
| 11.4 g per 100 g, yes. OPs example is also 11%.
| rqtwteye wrote:
| That means around 33g per can so almost nothing has
| changed.
| gridder wrote:
| Yeah and in Europe the can is not 12oz (35.5cl) but 33cl
| margalabargala wrote:
| > made me want to brush my teeth immediately afterwards.
|
| Note: do not brush your teeth immediately after drinking
| soda. The sugar (or rather the byproducts of the digestion of
| sugar by bacteria in your mouth) and the phosphoric acid in
| the soda will temporarily soften your enamel, which will then
| be partially removed by brushing.
| flossmaster wrote:
| It's best to wait a while. But then, when you do brush, go
| ahead and floss too!
| therealdrag0 wrote:
| But a rinse with water would be wise and harmless right?
| margalabargala wrote:
| Correct.
| hn_acker wrote:
| Are you sure that the difference isn't from sugar in the UK
| Coca Cola vs. high fructose corn syrup in US Coca Cola? The
| prevalence of HFCS in the US is partially (largely?) due to
| corn subsidies on top of the cheapness of producing HFCS [1].
|
| [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-
| fructose_corn_syrup#Unite...
| mattbee wrote:
| I know a lot of UK soft drinks changed their recipes in
| 2018 - I guess I was more surprised that Coca Cola isn't
| the same thing the world over.
| Retric wrote:
| Pure water plus HFCS vs table sugar is generally
| indistinguishable in well conducted blind taste tests.
|
| People can often notice the difference in products because
| of other factors like the water used to bottle them etc.
| cjk2 wrote:
| I got rid of my car about a year ago and I got fed up of
| carrying bottles of the shit back from Tesco so just switched
| to water. I wasn't even drinking the sugar stuff. Made me
| think about the whole drinks industry a little.
| mattbee wrote:
| They were a tyranny in our house too! I bought a
| Sodastream, HobbyBrew CO2 cannister and an adapter to join
| the two together. For the cost of like 30 bottles of Diet
| Coke I now have cheap fizzy water and the kids can add
| squash to it.
| jstanley wrote:
| I looked at doing this but calculated that the CO2
| bottles work out more expensive than just buying bottled
| sparkling water from Lidl.
| cjk2 wrote:
| Yeah the CO2 bottles and exchange is expensive as hell.
| It's apparently cost effective if you use a commercial
| one but the outlay is pretty high. Not worth it either
| way IMHO. I just put up with flat shit.
| Tade0 wrote:
| I was surprised to note that this is actually on par with
| most juices - 10% difference give or take.
| bennyhill wrote:
| Juice is not really healthy, it may not be a dangerous part
| of a particularly active lifestyle but for most lifestyles
| it probably is dangerous, especially considering that it is
| probably replacing whole fruit.
| IggleSniggle wrote:
| Exactly. The fiber content of whole fruit is one of the
| major benefits! You can't just replace fruit, even with
| "real" juice.
| daveoc64 wrote:
| Coca-Cola did not change their standard "Coca-Cola Original
| Taste" drink to contain any less sugar in the UK.
|
| Some other drinks (including Pepsi) have been reformulated
| with less sugar in the UK, but Coca Cola isn't one of them.
| goosedragons wrote:
| Your taste buds adjust over time after you cut back. I used to
| drink a TON of soda and on the rare occasions I have one it's
| usually too sweet and I can't finish. There is sparkling water
| cola (no sugar, no sweetner) available in my area and it
| honestly tastes pretty close to what I remember cola tasting
| like at my peak soda days.
| Bluecobra wrote:
| I would be curious to this as well if they truly made it less
| sweet. In the past they tried this with Coke C2 but instead
| swapped it with artificial sweeteners (yuck). Nowadays I only
| drink sparkling water and avoid added sugars like the plague.
| Now I find Coke way too sweet now to the point that it's
| enjoyable. I can't believe that when I was younger I would
| drink multiple cans per day.
|
| As a sidebar, I really like British style baked beans. Trying
| to buy something locally made in the US with the same amount of
| sugar is impossible. For example, Heinz Vegetarian beans
| contains 31.5g! of added sugar per can. Even if you go to Whole
| Foods, the Amy's brand contains the same amount of sugar. The
| UK version only contains 12g, so I end up buying the imported
| beans.
| RetroTechie wrote:
| > Trying to buy something locally made in the US with the
| same amount of sugar is impossible.
|
| I avoid processed foods whenever practical, added sugar among
| the reasons. Sugar (and too much of it) is added to a
| ridiculous % of products, for no good reason.
|
| In your example: try dried (white) beans. Soak overnight,
| cook ~1 hour until the beans are soft, steep or add eg.
| potato starch to bind leftover liquid, and then: add tomato
| paste & salt to taste. Just concentrated tomato, not ketchup
| / pasta sauce! Personally I add some chili paste as well,
| various herbs / spices could also go in but are really not
| needed.
|
| Tastes waaay better than the canned stuff from supermarket.
| Practically 0 sugar in it, and not as much water as in the
| canned stuff.
| tjr wrote:
| I have mixed regular Coke with club soda at home, and
| restaurants are often willing to do this for you too if you
| ask.
| onemoresoop wrote:
| If you manage to take a break from Coke for a while then when
| you come back to it it's really undrinkable. I personally
| stopped drinking this or any similar hi sugar soft drinks a
| while ago and really makes me nauseous if I try.
| alexb_ wrote:
| The funny thing about Coke is that they have literally invented
| a version that tastes exactly the same, except it has zero
| calories and zero sugar. It's called Coke Zero.
|
| We have two versions of Coke, both taste exactly the same
| except one kills you and one doesn't, and people will still
| voluntarily choose the one that kills you instead.
| garaetjjte wrote:
| It doesn't taste exactly the same though.
| hombre_fatal wrote:
| I think it does. But even so, 80% of the taste with 0% of
| the calories seems like a bargain. Getting some marginal
| pleasure for 140 extra calories seems like a bad trade-off
| unless you're not trying to lose weight.
| kiwijamo wrote:
| For me Zero tastes quite different and quite unpleasant.
| I had the same senstation of unpleasant flavour with Diet
| as well. If the only option was Zero/Diet/etc I probaly
| would just give up Coke altogethrer.
| kiwijamo wrote:
| I agree. In my experience all the Coke Diet/Zero/etc
| varieties has this really distinctive taste and the
| aftertaste is also quite different from Classic. My husband
| is a fan of Zero and also claims it tastes the same. He has
| occassionally poured Zero into a glass for me thinking I
| couldn't tell the difference. Every single time I take one
| sip and that's all I need to identify it. YMMV.
| mrguyorama wrote:
| That bad artificial sweetener aftertaste is way less
| pronounced if you are making a Rum and Coke though, so I
| always use Coke Zero for my adult beverages. Can't let
| the sugar kill me when I'm having several cups of vodka!
| alexb_ wrote:
| Diet Coke absolutely tastes different, but Coke and Coke
| Zero taste exactly the same - I doubt you would get a
| reliable result if you did a blind test.
| dumbfounder wrote:
| Which is which? Aspartame is the devil.
| alexb_ wrote:
| You're thinking of Diet Coke. Aspartame absolutely does
| have a taste, but it has also been studied an absolutely
| insane amount over literal decades and nobody can ever
| actually pin down a negative health effect from it.
| theshrike79 wrote:
| Aspartame and/or Asesulfame K make my farts smell like
| literal death.
|
| You know the kind that's not even funny, the kind that
| makes you yourself gag from just a little whiff.
| dumbfounder wrote:
| This says Coke Zero has aspartame: https://www.coca-
| colacompany.com/about-us/faq/what-is-aspart...
| ianburrell wrote:
| Coke Zero has aspartame has main sweetener. It also has
| acesulfame potassium.
| WalterBright wrote:
| I drank a couple Cokes a day for many, many years. I finally
| decided to quit. It took a full year before losing desire for
| Coke. I tried a few sips of it, and it actually tasted bad.
|
| Switched to diet Coke, and drank that for a few more years.
| Then decided that was probably just as bad, and now drink
| sparkling water.
|
| I no longer have any desire to drink sweetened beverages of any
| sort.
|
| Being older, I decided to stop eating all ice cream, cookies,
| candy bars, pie, etc., about 2 months ago. This is difficult.
| I've tried that before, and failed.
| WalterBright wrote:
| I quit consuming protein powder, too. I can't find a brand
| that is just protein powder, without any sweetener of any
| sort, even at health nut stores. I switched to eating boiled
| eggs instead.
| adamseabrook wrote:
| Unflavoured whey protein isolate isn't hugely popular but
| you can get it online.
|
| US: https://nutricost.com/collections/protein/products/nutr
| icost...
|
| AU: https://www.bulknutrients.com.au/products/whey-protein-
| isola...
|
| edit - I should add, you can get a bit of an idea of the
| quality of the protein powder by just looking at the
| percentage of protein in it. Nutricost is 85% and Bulk
| Nutrients is 87%. Doesn't leave much room to shove other
| ingredients in with protein levels that high.
|
| You can also go buy 20kg bags of WPI from NZ (which is
| where I think most of these retail products get their WPI
| from) https://www.nzmp.com/global/en/products/ingredients/t
| ypes/pr...
| NemoNobody wrote:
| OWN Brand protein drinks are what I drink.
| Treegarden wrote:
| I too ran into that issue as I nearly cut all sugar from my
| life since 6 months. As the other pointed out, here is my
| alternative, which is great [0]! I once drank it raw, it
| was terrible. But usually I blend it with the European
| version of Soylent powder and then it tastes amazing. 1.
| https://www.natureletics.de/products/natureletics-pure-
| natur...
| hn_user82179 wrote:
| I think it helps to look for protein powder meant to be
| incorporated into other things (as opposed to ones you mix
| with milk and drink directly).
|
| [1] Quest brand:
| https://www.questnutrition.com/collections/protein-
| powders/p...
|
| [2] essentially powdered egg whites are easy to find, for
| example: https://www.amazon.com/Its-Just-Protein-Non-GMO-
| Unflavored/d...
| monadicmonad wrote:
| My go to: https://www.raworganicwhey.com/
| samatman wrote:
| One that's easy to find in stores is "collagen peptides", I
| add them to oatmeal, pretty good. And to echo a sibling
| comment, unflavored whey protein is harder to find, but
| it's out there, one of my grocers stocks it.
| tayo42 wrote:
| That's surprising, my local upscale supermarket even has
| like multiple brands of plain whey protein. I'd probably
| just order it online then. I like to mix it sometimes with
| cocoa powder, then just more or less chug it lol
| WalterBright wrote:
| Read the ingredients closely. Sometimes, the sweetener
| has a chemical name you won't recognize.
| geoka9 wrote:
| Talk about timing--I was literally downing a glass of this
| as I was reading your comment:
|
| https://canadianprotein.com/products/bulk-grass-fed-new-
| zeal...
|
| They ship to the US for free, too.
| erfgh wrote:
| You can't find a brand because people don't buy it because
| it tastes awful.
| dnissley wrote:
| For unflavored protein powder I like the Naked brand:
| https://nakednutrition.com
| syntaxing wrote:
| I drink Orgain which I buy from Costco (the regular 20g
| one, not a fan of their "plant based one" or 30g one.) It
| uses monk fruit as a sweetener instead of sugar.
| zacte wrote:
| I have a similar story, used to drink a litre of coke every
| couple of days when I was 15. At some point I decided I
| didn't want that life any more and quit. It's been several
| years now and I still can't stand the taste of coke. It just
| tastes so artificial with an awful after taste; and I've
| never really had a sweet tooth anyway.
|
| Just regular ol' water is eternal
| iforgotpassword wrote:
| > Then decided that was probably just as bad, and now drink
| sparkling water.
|
| Heh that's usually what gets everybody who visits Germany for
| the first time: what's with Germans and that sparkling water?
| I never realized it isn't really a thing in most parts of the
| world.
|
| And it seems pretty divisive to folks visiting from outside
| Europe. Some think it's disgusting, some get used to it after
| a while and like it.
|
| I drink both, plain water and sparkling water. Sometimes I
| feel the urge to have something more than just water,
| especially in the summer returning home and being really
| thirsty, and usually sparkling water is enough to fool my
| senses. So depending on where you are, maybe you wanna try it
| for some time if you're trying to get off coke or other soda.
| WalterBright wrote:
| To satisfy my need for chocolate, I buy cacau nibs (raw
| chocolate).
| onemoresoop wrote:
| > 8g of sugar is enough
|
| 8g of sugar is enough for the taste but not enough for the
| crack effect to take place. Coca Cola et all did plenty of
| research into how to get their product to sell ever higher
| quantities (addictive properties).
| whatamidoingyo wrote:
| Yeah, that's why my drink list contains mostly water, coffee,
| and tea. Trying to cut the energy drink habit, which is
| incredibly hard (they have 0g sugar, although for sure have
| artificial sugars). I'm down to about 1 per day, sometimes none
| at all.
|
| When I finally manage to cut them out, I will be incredibly
| proud. But, man, they've made them so, so addicting.
|
| Also... I don't know. I drink bottled water, which has
| microplastics, eh? There's no winning.
| mc32 wrote:
| I despise these companies for pumping sugar into everything...
| however, understand that street drinks in those countries are
| plenty sweet themselves and can be less hygienic as well
| --street food is also very fatty or oily. So, both local and
| foreign chains or brands exploit sugar and fats but so do the
| mom and pop or in many cases, kid street vendors. The stuff
| sells and costs less.
|
| In mexico they sell horchate in plastic baggies with straws
| --boy, are they sweet.
| nox101 wrote:
| Why despise them? If you mom put more sugar in one of her
| recipes because she thought it made it more tasty, and she
| got compliments on it when she served it, would you despise
| her?
|
| It doesn't take malice to add sugar. It only takes people
| choosing to buy
| wolverine876 wrote:
| I wonder how much sugar craving depends on age. As a child I
| would happily eat spoonfuls of plain sugar. Children seem much
| happier eating candy, etc. than adults. I wonder if sugar
| provides some additional value to children.
|
| So when adults say, 'I discovered I didn't need as much sugar',
| maybe they, like the children, are just following their
| biological urges.
|
| I did a very quick look for research on the question but didn't
| find anything.
| therealdrag0 wrote:
| I think this is part of it. Iirc "studies show" appreciation
| of bitterness (coffee, dark chocolate, broccoli) correlated
| with age. Iirc it was biologically related, but don't quote
| me on that.
| positr0n wrote:
| I've seen speculation that this is evolutionarily driven.
|
| Kids do not have the wisdom to know which bitter foods are
| ok and which could harm you, so they avoid them all or die.
| By adulthood the selection pressure is much smaller because
| you will have learned what is safe to eat.
| rqtwteye wrote:
| The amazing thing is that 8g is still a lot.
| swalling wrote:
| There is another alternative that is getting more popular in
| the US, which are Olipop sodas. They are sweetened with stevia
| and have only 2-5g of sugar, plus a lot of added fiber.
|
| As someone who very rarely drinks soda of any kind, I find
| typical Coke or Pepsi products overwhelmingly sweet and feel
| sick if I actually drink a whole can. I can stomach Olipop
| though. (No paid endorsement here, I discovered these through
| my partner. She is a health-obsessed person with a sweet
| tooth.)
| chikenf00t wrote:
| I've switched to the Ollipop brand from regular soda. The taste
| is great and it doesn't make me feel like garbage. I'm never
| looking back.
| joshspankit wrote:
| As well, the impacts of fructose and HFC.
| nerdjon wrote:
| Not trying to give Nestle a pass here since they have done some
| really bad things.
|
| But something I could not find in the article, are there any
| other differences between the formulas? So it's focused on added
| sugar, but do the base ingredients have less sugar? So what is
| the difference after looking at the numbers? Are they using
| cheaper ingredients in the low to mid income places?
|
| No doubt they are doing bad things here, but it feels like I am
| missing some details.
| WalterBright wrote:
| Everybody loves sugar. It's in our genes. Some just are able to
| resist it more than others.
| RetroTechie wrote:
| It's also aquired taste: after enough time on a 0-added-sugar
| diet, you don't miss the sugar anymore.
|
| But it's a kind of "fast attack, slow decay" thing: you get
| hooked in no time, but it takes ages too lose that craving for
| sweetness.
|
| No doubt food companies are _very_ aware of this. Get 'em
| young, and... who cares if it ruins people's health, as long as
| it's legal & makes nice profit.
| sevagh wrote:
| Sugar is normal and delicious. There's a whole world of
| pastries, cakes, desserts eaten in every culture in the
| world. Fruits are sugary and delicious. Not all sugary treats
| are an addiction conspiracy. I don't understand 0-sugar
| people, as if there is a "default state" of being where 0
| sugar must be consumed? According to whom?
| autoexec wrote:
| Nestle is a corporate serial killer who should have been given
| the death penalty years ago. The fact that we know what they've
| done before, but still have to watch them continue to
| intentionally hurt children over and over again across decades
| while nothing is done about it just shows how our society has
| been shaped to make us powerless. If we had any ability at all to
| impose meaningful consequences against Nestle we'd clearly have
| done it by now. If the literal millions of infants they murdered
| weren't enough to make that happen, and the millions of child
| slaves harvesting their cocoa hasn't, I very much doubt that
| added sugar is going to be the thing that finally does.
| barbazoo wrote:
| Fun fact, their internal slogan was (is?)
|
| > Von der Wiege bis ins Kastle - alles Nestle!
|
| which roughly translates to
|
| > From the cradle to the casket - everything Nestle!
| spondylosaurus wrote:
| A recent piece from ProPublica taps into the related "toddler
| milk" phenomenon and how, in essence, it's a way for formula
| manufacturers to capture the market in areas where they legally
| can't advertise baby formula.
|
| https://www.propublica.org/article/how-america-waged-global-...
| fuzzfactor wrote:
| >children hooked on sugar in lower-income countries
|
| The children in higher-income countries were already spoken for
| by much more well-established multinationals.
|
| It started centuries ago after moving tonnes of raw cargo from
| plantations in tropical agricultural colonies.
|
| The crop was not commercialized internationally like the crystals
| were. The syrup was extracted, crystallized, and accumulated for
| most efficient transportation as a fungible commodity in bulk.
| The highly concentrated active ingredient of an agricultural
| product, at a landed cost very low among the digestible
| alternatives in so many markets. Tropical oils come to mind as
| another concentrated active ingredient from other crops.
|
| Low cost alone can make some things fly off the shelf by
| themselves, but when you've got bulk, and trading, you get more
| _surplus_ than lots of other times. And when the cost of some
| parcel of excess drops to effectively zero or even negative, it
| can fly off the shelf with much greater momentum, even if it is
| temporary while it lasts. But occasional stimulus effects like
| that over the centuries could outlast a market upset like few
| other things, sugar (and fat) are widely regarded as habit-
| forming. No stronger supply-chain to support the habit than to
| deal with the pure material.
|
| Looks like Nestle is a multinational re-exporting a highly value-
| added commodity in bulk (at its own scale), and to some tropical
| countries which have great agricultural potential themselves. No
| wonder it seems to have been accomplished in a deceptive way.
| mncharity wrote:
| > Parents looking for information on infant nutrition may be
| directed to this platform and be exposed to content that steers
| them towards Nestle products. [...] recipes
|
| Perhaps _steered_ in more ways than one. Baby digestive comfort
| with breast milk varies with maternal diet. Some foods cause
| substantial infant distress. So there 's an exploratory debugging
| process around material diet expansion, with backing off to a
| known-good bland diet, and experimental (re)introduction of
| foods. A friend was very systematic, and ended up with a list of
| problematic foods. Nothing singular, there are lots of similar
| lists out there.
|
| Now you get a lot of mail around pregnancy and birth - it's a
| prime advertising window with new habits being formed. One bit of
| mail was a substantial booklet of recipes for new moms. Oddly
| substantial, with no ads. Also oddly, the recipe overlap with her
| breast-feeding distress list was _massive_. "WTF?" - a puzzle.
| How could someone manage to write a recipe booklet for new moms
| where every recipe harms breast feeding?? Until on the back page,
| in small print, "(c) Nestle". Then not a puzzle at all.
| bhaskara2 wrote:
| Nestle is an evil company, it has caused deaths of thousands of
| babies and continues to add to that body count shamelessly.
| Countries should unite in fighting this evil and prosecute it's
| executives with death penalty. Hopefully indian government bans
| this company
| mzs wrote:
| Have the authors considered this is to help fight malnutrition?
| henriquenunez wrote:
| Yes, giving sugary stuff instead of lowering the surplus margin
| on high quality food wolf in sheep's skin
| erfgh wrote:
| I know I will burn karma for this but what the heck: If you don't
| like it, don't buy it. That their sugar-added products are not
| sold in Switzerland or Germany is simply because people there
| would not buy them enough to make profit. There is nothing
| unethical about adding sugar to a food.
| henriquenunez wrote:
| clearly someone here is probably coming from a wealthy country
| and never had food insecurity in their vicinity.
|
| I do not mean to give you a "woke" lesson or whatever, but the
| reality where I come from is that people do not have the
| instruction level to know that this product is harmful to the
| health. The child will just ask for it, and if they are
| lucky/hard working enough to afford it, parents will buy it.
| manuel_w wrote:
| I've got no idea about finances and would like to invest a
| meaningful part of my money in ETFs. Because I'm so clueless I
| assume I cannot really go wrong with a ETF that is tracking the
| MSCI Developed World Index.
|
| My problem: I really really really hate Nestle and don't want to
| invest even a single penny in them. What can I do? I assume
| they're in the included in the index. There are ESG-weighted
| alternatives, but Nestle managed to get quite good ESG ratings,
| so I presume they're included there as well.
| addaon wrote:
| If it's worth it to you, tell your investment manager that you
| want to track MSCI Developed World minus Nestle. You'll get
| charged a fee for a manually-managed brokerage compared to just
| dumping everything into an ETF, but this type of detailed
| preference is literally what active investment management is
| for.
| beezlebroxxxxxx wrote:
| If you have enough money for it to be worthwhile, you can
| essentially approach a financial advisor with exactly your
| needs and they will manage your money to ignore Nestle (though
| check their actual qualifications and whether they're a
| fiduciary).
|
| The pro of this approach: you don't have to think about or
| manage that task.
|
| The cons: you'll need enough money for that to be worthwhile,
| you might not see as good a return as you would simply parking
| your money in an ETF, you will likely face higher fees than
| normal for active management.
|
| You could save money by actively managing your investments
| yourself, but that would be quite time consuming and generally
| requires you to have more upfront capital to invest.
| rqtwteye wrote:
| It's ok to hate on Nestle but let's not forget that most of the
| food industry is basically leading a war on the world's health in
| search of profits.
|
| The amount of terrible ingredients and misleading information
| they are putting on the market is just stunning. And the cost in
| terms of people's health and the cost is enormous.
|
| It's kind of hard to understand that we let them get away with
| this.
| erfgh wrote:
| Without any exaggeration the article claims that Nestle is the
| most evil entity possible because some of its products contain
| added sugar.
| sydbarrett74 wrote:
| I just think it's hilarious that the Swiss founder, Heinrich
| Nestle, legally changed his very German name to Henri Nestle
| because he thought it sounded more posh and bourgeois, thus
| masking his family's modest origins.
| camelboy wrote:
| I think sugar consumption is not unique to Lower-income
| countries. A study showed that a US kids consumes more than 49
| pounds of sugar a year. All these are the processed food from the
| big box grocery stores. I suspect the sugar consumption is way
| less over in those countries where as a large segment of the
| population is unable to purchase processed food from the
| expensive grocery stores. Also sugary drinks are consumed by the
| kids at school to get some energy, many are unable to afford a
| breakfast and opt for that sugary syrup sold at the school
| canteen.
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