Food marketing to youth: current threats and opportunities.

ly all of it promotes unhealthy foods. We expect children to be exposed to tV commercials, company websites, and radio ads; however, food marketing is also part of the childhood landscape on billboards, school scoreboards, vending machines, packaging and promotions on store shelves, and restaurant signage.1–5 today, food companies also visit youth on their cell phones, through “word of mouth” on social media like Facebook and twitter, and hide out as product placements in video games, television shows, and movies.1,5,6 in the past, if parents limited television time and kept the tV set out of their child’s bedroom, they might be able to prevent their child from seeing the average 13 ads per day viewed, but that is no longer enough.7 every year, parents are undermined by $1.6 billion dollars of marketing designed to circumvent their influence and convince their children to consume products like fruit drinks, soda, fast food, and sugary breakfast cereals.8 exposure to food marketing not only increases children’s preferences and requests to parents for advertised foods in the short term, but it also leads to increased intake and poor diet over time.1,5,9,10 Parents may be most surprised by how much food marketing occurs in schools. in 2006, $186 million of food industry expenditures aimed at youth occurred in schools.8 Although there has been some national progress in removing sugary drinks from schools due to a combination of strong state legislation that removes unhealthy beverages and self-regulation by the American beverage Association,11,12 food companies have not abandoned the captive student audience and the opportunity to be viewed as supportive of education. Food and beverage brands still appear on corporate sponsored curricula, vending machines, scoreboards, school buses, in-school televisions and computers, fundraising materials, and academic incentive programs.5,13,14 A range of stakeholders and strategies are needed to reduce the harm caused by child-directed food marketing. the 2006 institute of Medicine (iOM) report on food marketing to children provided clear advice for government, schools, researchers, and parents, as well as food and beverage companies, restaurants, media and entertainment companies, industry trade groups, and those who set marketing practice standards.5 two recent papers by Kraak and colleagues found that in the 5 years following the iOM report, only moderate-to-limited progress has been made in most domains, with virtually no progress in establishing government oversight of industry practices.15,16 interestingly, one group that has made moderate progress is the food industry itself.