What the new studies REALLY say about red and processed meat

New studies this week in the Annals of Internal Medicine have generated much fiery news coverage.

For example, Time's headline says: "Should You Stop Eating Red Meat? A New Paper Has a Controversial Answer." As always, the nutrition reporter portrays nutrition science as fickle, endlessly reversing itself.

It's not true. The actual scientific content in the new studies confirms what we already knew.

The best available evidence suggests that reducing red and processed meat consumption will reduce risk of death from cardiovascular disease and cancer.

It always is the case that nutrition scientists and communicators must accomplish two tasks: 

1. understand the available evidence; and 
2. reflect on what burden of proof should be used for nutrition policy decision making.

The new studies made atypical decisions about Task #2. For reasons that are not clear to me -- perhaps out of a scientific sense of caution or perhaps out of a bias in favor of red and processed meat -- they ramped up the burden of proof that they apply to recommendations that advise less red and processed meat. Citing research guidelines that give highest scores for pharmaceutical trials [edited slightly 4pm], they rate most of the available evidence in any direction as weak. This is not how I would have communicated the evidence. In my view, it is understandable that randomized control trials cannot be widely used on this topic, because one would have to wait too long for a sufficient number of cancers or heart attacks attributable to a meat intake intervention in a well-powered study. So, I have long accepted cohort and observational studies as the best available evidence on this topic. The new studies do pretty much the same, but they label each piece of evidence as "weak." They are free to apply these labels, and I feel free to ignore these labels.

Turning to Task #1, the studies confirm what I already knew. For example, here are my statistical interpretation sentences for several main results from the new studies.

On average, reducing weekly unprocessed red meat intake by 3 servings is associated with:

• 7% lower risk of death, 
• 10% lower risk of death from cardiovascular disease,
• 6% lower risk of stroke,
• 10% lower risk of type 2 diabetes,
• 7% lower risk of death from cancer.

The list of results continues for processed meat.

If you want to describe these effects as "small" and you want dietary changes that reduce your risk by twice as much, then knock yourself out. You may reduce your red meat intake by perhaps approximately [note: qualifying adjective added 4pm] 6 servings.

I recognize that these results are accompanied by blistering disparagement of recommendations to eat less red and processed meat, but I don't trust these authors enough to place credence on their rhetorical choices. Their scientific results are what matters. 

Reading these scientific results, even acknowledging the limits of our knowledge, I will continue to support existing recommendations to eat less red and processed meat. No better evidence exists.

Dietary guidelines, processed meat, and risk of cancer

In a public comment submitted today, my colleagues Fang Fang Zhang, Jennifer Pomeranz, and I encourage the 2020-2025 Dietary Guidelines Advisory Committee (DGAC) to evaluate the entire scientific literature on processed meat and colon cancer risk.

The DGAC is the external committee that summarizes the scientific evidence on nutrition and health, which two federal departments, USDA and DHHS, then use in writing the actual Dietary Guidelines for Americans, an influential document in U.S. nutrition policy.

USDA and DHHS have determined that the 2020-2025 DGAC may only address topics that were explicitly given in a list of questions by the departments.

One of the questions is: "What is the relationship between dietary patterns consumed and risk of certain types of cancer?"

Our public comment today recommends that the DGAC include the entire scientific literature on processed meat and cancer risk, as part of its systematic review of evidence on dietary patterns and cancer.

Why is this even in doubt?

As our recent article in the Milbank Quarterly recounts, in the previous 2015-2020 Dietary Guidelines for Americans, the federal government muddled its message on processed meat and cancer.

On the one hand, it included lower intake of processed meat in a list of characteristics of healthy eating patterns: "Lower intakes of meats, including processed meats; processed poultry; sugar-sweetened foods, particularly beverages; and refined grains have often been identified as characteristics of healthy eating patterns."

On the other hand, it said that processed meats can be recommended as long as sodium, saturated fats, added sugars, and total calories are within limits. This latter favorable comment in the official policy document from USDA and DHHS had no basis in the earlier independent scientific report from the 2015-2020 DGAC.

Even though it is not responsible for the final DGA report, we think the 2015-2020 DGAC report may have overlooked some of the important research on processed meat and colon cancer, by interpreting the words "dietary patterns" too strictly, screening out some research on processed meat merely because this one food category is not a "dietary pattern."

Why is the cancer risk from processed meat important?

The issue is important because the best available systematic literature reviews concluded that consuming processed meat increases the risk of colon cancer. In particular, see authoritative reports from the International Agency for Research on Cancer and the World Cancer Research Fund and American Institute of Cancer Research.

Luxian Zeng, Fang Fang Zhang, other colleagues, and I recently reported in the Journal of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics (JAND) on trends in processed meat intake based on data from the Nutrition and Health Examination Survey (NHANES). While red meat declined, processed meat held steady in recent years. This issue is big enough to matter for national nutrition policy.

What are the policy implications of ignoring this issue?

Currently, far from encouraging reductions in processed meat intake, the federal government supports advertising and marketing programs to increase consumption. The semi-public checkoff programs have been covered previously in this blog. Just to give one current illustration, here is advertising from the federal government's pork checkoff program for bacon and ice cream. If the Dietary Guidelines for Americans were based on a full evaluation of the scientific literature about processed meat and colon cancer, it might facilitate policies to encourage reductions, or at the very least a halt to these advertising programs encouraging yet more processed meat consumption.

National Pork Board advertising endorsed by USDA.

Should the federal government stop encouraging Americans to eat more beef, pork, and cheese?

The question for this new video (third in a series) is: Should the federal government stop encouraging Americans to eat more beef, pork, and cheese?

For more information about reform of the federal commodity checkoff programs discussed in this video, see the bipartisan Opportunities for Fairness in Farming Act of 2017, introduced last year by Senators Mike Lee (R-UT) and Cory Booker (D-NJ).

 
Parke Wilde - Federal Commodity Checkoff Programs from Tufts Friedman School on Vimeo.

Federal court stops $3 million annual checkoff payments for obsolete "Other White Meat" slogan

The federal district court in Washington, DC, yesterday stopped the $3 million annual payments that the federal government's semi-public pork checkoff program makes to the National Pork Producers Council (NPPC), a private trade association, for the purchase of the "Other White Meat" slogan.

The ruling confirms something that I have been reporting for a dozen years. In 2006, the pork checkoff program first announced plans to purchase the industry's own slogan from NPPC for $60 million, in payments of $3 million per year for 20 years. At the time, I noted that USDA was keeping the financial appraisal secret. I had serious doubts that the slogan could be worth such a sum, because who else but the pork board would want to buy it? Were the artichoke producers vigorously bidding up the price for the "Other White Meat" slogan?

It seemed clear what was really going on. The semi-public checkoff program, which is established by Congress and overseen by USDA, must follow rules such as never using its money for lobbying or other types of political influence. The inflated payments circumvented these rules, allowing the checkoff program to shift $3 million each year to the private trade association, without expecting any actual goods or services in return.

This pork industry plan seemed bad for the public interest and bad for pork farmers whose mandatory payments fund the checkoff program. A new report this week from the Government Accountability Office (GAO) says more broadly that checkoff programs have shortcomings in transparency and in USDA oversight of contracting.

Over the years, I requested the appraisal under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), but USDA refused my request and then on appeal just sent censored documents with the actual financial details blacked out. The Humane Society of the United States (HSUS) was finally given the actual appraisal many years later, and, as expected, it fell far short of justifying the sale price.

Many years have passed, and the federal district court yesterday said the initial 2006 sale -- however bad it may be -- now falls under a statute of limitations. But, the court allowed the plaintiffs, including HSUS and a pork farmer in Iowa, to question a USDA decision in 2016 to continue the payments. By that time, USDA had a new appraisal, which had the same problems as the earlier appraisal.

In yesterday's ruling, the federal district court sharply summarized why the sale fails to meet the standards of the federal government's Administrative Procedures Act (APA):

The Secretary approved spending $3 million per year for the purchase of the trademarks for another ten years based on an expert’s determination of their replacement cost, that is, what it would cost to develop and market an entirely new promotional campaign today. But neither the agency nor the expert adequately explains why this calculation sheds any light on what the 2016 review was supposed to ascertain: the current value of the set of four trademarks to the agency. The fundamental problem is that the three trademarks that include The Other White Meat slogan have been declared to be obsolete, and they have been retired from active use. So their value is minimal, or at best, undetermined. And the record contains no effort to ascertain the value of the fourth mark – the “Pork and Design” logo that consists of the word “pork” written across a blue triangular “pork loin silhouette” – at all. 

The Secretary’s 2016 decision also fails to explain why it makes sense to predicate future payments on the cost of replacing The Other White Meat when the cost of replacing The Other White Meat has already been incurred. Moreover, while the agency states that the expert endeavored to calculate the value of the marks based upon the cost of developing a new trademark with the same level of effectiveness as the old trademarks, “as measured by aided awareness studies of the percentage of people who are aware of the trademark,” there is no data in the record underlying the expert’s selection of 40% awareness as the target measure. The expert simply cut the high level of awareness garnered by The Other White Meat slogan in its heyday in half and calculated what it would cost to buy something else that effective now. But without any analysis of how much The Other White Meat still resonates in the consumer consciousness today, or, more important, whether the blue triangular logo has gained any traction in the market at all, this approach to quantifying “current value” is completely arbitrary and cannot pass muster under the APA.

Although the pork industry and USDA surely will appeal the decision, it is pleasing to see the problem with this payment stated so clearly by a federal court.

Checkoff program supporters seek to shield checkoff boards from freedom-of-information scrutiny

Here is a small example of Washington at its worst.

The Capital Press reports this week that several agriculture commodity organizations have successfully lobbied members of Congress to include a provision in the House agricultural appropriations bill that would protect the federal government's "checkoff" commodity promotion boards from public records disclosure requests under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA).

Through these programs, the federal government uses its taxation powers to enforce the collection of more than $500 million each year in mandatory assessments on commodity producers, to be spent on campaigns such as "Got Milk" and "Pork. Be Inspired."

Because these semi-public programs are established by Congress and the commodity boards are appointed by the Secretary of Agriculture, they have always been subject to freedom-of-information rules. It stands to reason: farmers and the public deserve to know what's really going on with these well-funded USDA-sponsored programs.

As a reminder, or for new readers, here is the story of how this U.S. Food Policy blog used FOIA to get information about the dubious $60 million sale of the "Other White Meat" slogan from the National Pork Producers Council (NPPC) to the National Pork Board (NPB). We concluded that this sale -- for a slogan that now is nearly worthless and has been replaced by "Be Inspired" -- really was just a way for the checkoff program to funnel money to the NPPC.

Our investigation is exactly the type of public interest research the new bill is designed to prevent. The House appropriations bill language reads as follows:

“The funding used to operate and carry out the activities of the various research and promotion programs is provided by producers and industry stakeholders, and employees on the boards are not federal employees. Therefore, the committee urges USDA to recognize that such boards are not subject to the provisions of 5 U.S.C. Section 552 (the Freedom of Information Act).”

Let people know what you think about this.

Danny Vinik in Politico reports on pork "Other White Meat" sale

Danny Vinik in Politico's Agenda today:

Pork hasn't been "the other white meat" for years—after a 24-year run as the centerpiece of billboards and the butt of jokes, the slogan was retired in 2011 and replaced with "Pork: Be Inspired," a logo you might have seen on the apron of Ted Cruz as he grilled pork chops at the Iowa State fair last week.

But the National Pork Board, a government-sponsored entity funded by a tax on hog farmers, still writes a check for $3 million every year to license the unused slogan—a bewildering payout that only makes sense, critics say, when you realize the money goes straight to an industrial pork lobby that has long been closely tied to the board. Farmers who pay for the board are crying foul, saying the deal amounts to a scheme to let the board skirt anti-lobbying laws and promote an agenda directly against their interests.

My question, quoted in the article:

“Are the artichoke producers competing for the slogan "Pork: The Other White Meat"? No, I don't think so.”

I recognize that many pork producers are hesitant to criticize the National Pork Producers Council (NPPC), but I think that any who do look over the history of this slogan sale will be upset at how their mandatory payments are being spent.

For additional background, here is some past reporting in U.S. Food Policy.

U.S. Court of Appeals revives lawsuit over $60 million sale of "Pork the Other White Meat" slogan

In a setback for the federal "checkoff" generic advertising and promotion program for pork, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia on August 14 revived a lawsuit (.pdf) brought by Iowa pork farmer Harvey Dillenburg and the Humane Society of the United States (HSUS).

Dillenburg and the HSUS objected to a 2006 deal in which the semi-public federal pork checkoff program agreed to pay $60 million to the National Pork Producers Council (a private-sector trade association). The U.S. Food Policy blog began investigating this strange transaction shortly afterwards, and I eventually filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request to acquire the appraisal documents that supposedly justified this large payment. To this day, the checkoff program pays $3 million in producer money each year to the NPPC for the "Pork the Other White Meat" slogan, even though the slogan is barely used any more.

A lawsuit by Dillenburg and HSUS was dismissed in 2013, on grounds that Dillenburg lacked standing. The new ruling this week by the federal appeals court reversed the ruling, saying that it is plausible that Dillenburg and other pork farmers were harmed by the "sweetheart deal" between the pork checkoff program and the NPPC.

Some pork industry organizations may want to revise their smug 2013 press statements about the lawsuit's earlier dismissal. The lawsuit will proceed in the lower court on its merits. The U.S. Court of Appeals did not tell the lower court how to rule, but it did give an eloquent and coherent summary of the problems with the $60 million sale.

Some pork producers who follow this story may wonder about the way their money has been spent. Quite understandably, producers may not be too vocal in endorsing a lawsuit in which the Humane Society is a party, because the society has been critical of the pork industry on several grounds in the past. Still, I imagine that some pork producers who read the new ruling (.pdf) will find it sensible.

Read additional coverage by Jack Bouboushian at Courthouse News Service ("Pork Board Must Answer for Spending Millions on Dead Slogan") and by Agri-Pulse:

In court documents, the plaintiffs of the case claim the Pork Board “did not buy the slogan (from NPPC) for its value as a marketing tool.” Rather, they say the purchase - to be doled out in $3 million increments for the next 20 years - was used “as a means to cut a sweetheart deal with (NPPC) to keep (NPPC) in business and support its lobbying efforts.” They say the board “overpaid for the slogan” and that the Pork Board's shift to the “Pork: Be Inspired” campaign “makes the initial slogan all but worthless.”

U.S. pork producers and importers pay $0.40 per $100 of value when pigs are sold and when pigs or pork products are brought into the U.S. to fund the checkoff. It is a violation of the federal orders that established checkoffs to use funds for lobbying interests. In a blog post, HSUS CEO Wayne Pacelle called the ruling “a potentially enormous win for animal welfare groups, small farmers, and environmentalists - since they've all felt the wrath of the NPPC's intense lobbying efforts.”

The "Trouble with Antibiotics" in U.S. animal agriculture production

Frontline last night had an excellent report, the Trouble with Antibiotics, on the plausible link between dangerous antibiotic resistant diseases and the overuse of antibiotics in U.S. meat production.

Poultry and hog producers use large amounts of antibiotics even in healthy animals, as a growth promoter and to prevent disease. As bacteria evolve to become resistant to these antibiotics, we lose important tools for treating deadly diseases in humans, including Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA).

For readers who want to inspect the scientific evidence for themselves, here are some links to research mentioned in the Frontline report.

Jessica Rinsky, Lance Price (interviewed in the report), and colleagues found livestock-associated MRSA in workers from industrial livestock operations but not workers from antibiotic-free livestock operations.

Andrew Waters, Lance Price, and colleagues found that MRSA bacteria reaches meat on supermarket shelves.

Joan Casey, Brian Schwartz, and colleagues found in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) that antibiotic-resistant bacteria cases in humans were geographically associated with the proximity of nearby meat producers in Pennsylvania. The Frontline interviewer did a great job questioning the scientists and explaining both the strengths and limits of this type of geographic association.

Concerned about the Frontline story, the federal government's National Pork Board has been scrambling to persuade people not to worry about this issue. Reuters reports today that the NPB is funding an online public information campaign to defend antibiotic use. The most damning part of the Reuters report alleges that the NPB is using search engine optimization (SEO) tools so that web users seeking information about antibiotics are directed to industry-friendly web sources.

Both Reuters and the Frontline report describe the pork board as an "industry" association, but the National Pork Board is a semi-public checkoff program. The U.S. Congress created this board, the Secretary of Agriculture appoints its members from a slate of candidates suggested by the industry, and the federal government uses its powers of taxation to collect the "mandatory assessment" -- a tax -- that funds this public information campaign. This is not a voluntary industry association. All pork board messages must be approved by the federal government as its own "government speech," so our government is complicit in this public information campaign to rebut the Frontline report.

The industry representatives interviewed in the Frontline report didn't really dispute any of the facts, but they engaged in a rhetorical game of shifting the burden of proof. They argued that no further regulation is needed, because there is not yet certain proof that some of the research associations represent true cause and effect. Since nothing is ever certain in this type of research, the industry representatives can feel safe that no level of evidence would ever clear their hurdle.

One of the best passages in the Frontline report was an interview with FDA Commissioner Margaret Hamburg. The interviewer asked why FDA does not collect information about the quantity of antibiotics administered by meat producers. Though Hamburg squirmed under the question, she essentially confirmed that FDA wanted this information but could not get it because of industry opposition. In other words, the industry representatives say no action should be taken until we have certain proof, while simultaneously hindering access to the data needed to investigate the question.

The industry is pursuing some voluntary steps to reduce antibiotic use for the purpose of "growth promotion," but it has defined this term narrowly so that most antibiotic use even in healthy animals will still continue.

The Frontline report is strongly recommended. Now is the time for stronger measures to restrain the overuse of antibiotics in U.S. meat production.

Frontline, October 14, 2014.

Maureen Ogle's history: In Meat We Trust

Maureen Ogle's new history of the meat industry is In Meat We Trust: An Unexpected History of Carnivore America (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt).  I enjoyed the many biographical summaries of leading industrial innovators (from Gustavus Swift to Coleman Natural Meats) and their critics (from Upton Sinclair to Michael Pollan and Michael Jacobson).

The book's most sound overall theme is that American consumers appear to demand contradictory things (perfect safety and environmental sustainability and yet low prices and massive quantities).  Ogle appeals to consumers to become more informed rather than throwing stones from afar.  In part, I think these contradictory demands arise because different consumers have always had different opinions, including sometimes well-motivated support for and concern about meat in general and industrial meat in particular.  Ogle instead treats these contradictory opinions as the ignorant and schizophrenic demand of a single personified American "we."  For example,

"If meat's American history tells us anything, it is that we Americans generally get what we want.  Meat three times a day? No problem.  Meat precut, deboned, and ready to cook?  There it is....  Organic, grass-fed, local pork and beef?  All yours, as long as you don't mind paying the price or taking the time to find it....  We're a complicated group, we Americans, and we struggle to reconcile our conflicting desires and passions."

In the end, Ogle ends up deeply skeptical of food system reformers and admiring of meat industry innovators: "So, thanks, Big Ag -- and the USDA and family and corporate farmers -- for giving us the cheap food that has nourished an extraordinary abundance of creative energy."  Here is a favorable review and interview by Chuck Jolley at Drovers Cattle Network.

Long-hidden details revealed about the pork checkoff program's $60 million purchase of the "Other White Meat" brand

Six years after I requested these documents under Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) rules, USDA recently released unredacted copies of documents about a $60 million financial transaction between USDA's National Pork Board (a semi-public "checkoff" program) and the National Pork Producers Council (a pork industry association).

The documents reveal the shaky basis for the Pork Board's 2006 purchase of the "Other White Meat" brand from the National Pork Producers Council for $60 million.  It looks to me like the sale price was drastically inflated as a way of funneling money from the semi-public checkoff program to the private-sector trade association.

Here is how it works.  The checkoff program collects more than $40 million each year in mandatory assessments from pork producers -- whether they want to contribute or not -- using the federal government's powers of taxation.  Some dissident pork producers object to this tax, but the Department of Justice forces them to pay up.  The federal government says that the advertisements serve the public interest and officially are recognized as "government speech."  There are rules about how pork checkoff money must be spent.  For example, it is not supposed to be used for lobbying.

Some pork industry executives wished this restricted money could be transferred to the National Pork Producers Council, which faces fewer rules and is allowed to lobby as much as it likes.  In 2006, with USDA approval, the NPPC sold the property rights to the "Other White Meat" brand to the pork checkoff program for $60 million, payable at $3 million per year for 20 years.

That year, I asked USDA's Agricultural Marketing Service (AMS) to share the appraisal on which this sale was based.  Who said this brand was worth $60 million?  Was there any risk that some other entity was going to bid up the price and steal the brand out from under the pork checkoff program?  Can you imagine, "Avocados: the Other White Meat"?

AMS refused to share the documents.  When I filed an administrative appeal, AMS shared only a redacted version, with key passages blacked out.  The agency claimed the missing information was "pre-decisional" and "deliberative" and hence not subject to FOIA rules.  I always knew this reason was unconvincing, but I never had the money or the stomach to file a lawsuit to press the point.

Now, six years later, the documents were released from USDA to the Humane Society of the United States (HSUS), as part of a lawsuit which has also filed a lawsuit challenging the legality of the "Other White Meat" purchase [Note Feb. 26: edited slightly to clarify that the HSUS originally received the documents in a proceeding that was separate from the lawsuit].  The HSUS had become curious about the pork checkoff program, because checkoff funds were being used to criticize the animal welfare society.

In the unredacted documents, it seems clear that there is no justification for accepting the $60 million price as legitimate.  The pork checkoff program seems to have agreed to an inflated price.  The documents claim that it would cost $36 million to rebuild a brand to replace the "Other White Meat" brand over 7 years if the pork checkoff program did not purchase the property.  With payments spread over 20 years at a specified interest rate, the total payments would be $60 million.

One problem with this computation is that it calculates interest on the payments over 20 years but wrongly treats the $36 million cost as if it happened instantaneously.  If one amortized the $36 million cost over 7 years, it would have been much smaller, and hence the total payment over 20 years also would have been much smaller than $60 million.

A second problem with this computation is that much of the original equity in the "Other White Meat" brand was built with pork producer checkoff moneys.  Asking them to pay again to purchase the brand seems like double-billing.

A third problem is that this computation assumes the pork checkoff program was under some real threat of losing the brand.  Really, the National Pork Producers Council never had any other buyer.

In the following images, you can see the redacted and unredacted versions of one key document.  Three things to notice are:

(1) The author is Mark Williams, a long-time insider who had an early role in developing the "Other White Meat" brand.  He is not an independent appraiser.

(2) There was nothing "pre-decisional" or "deliberative" about the redacted passsage.  That was just an excuse to avoid sharing with me the passage that was most embarrassing for the checkoff program.

(3)  The unredacted passage admits plainly that there never was any other buyer for this brand.  In the formerly blacked out passage, Mark Williams says, "While 'The Other White Meat' is extremely well known, it is recognized (principally in the U.S.) as being synonymous with (fresh) 'pork,' which strongly suggests that no branded marketer would be able to gain enough benefit from its use to make them a likely buyer."  That's exactly what I thought in 2006!

You can see why the pork checkoff program fought so hard to keep this information secret.  The whole purchase seems very wrong to me.  I think the hard-working pork producers themselves are being victimized as they are forced to pay up for such nonsense.  And I don't think the federal government's semi-public checkoff program should be set loose from the rules that normally circumscribe how checkoff money is used.

This sale should be reversed and the ongoing annual payments should be stopped. 

Redacted version (2006)

Unredacted version (newly released)

Wayne Pacelle and Chuck Jolley discuss pork checkoff

Veteran food industry journalist Chuck Jolley recently discussed the pork checkoff program with Wayne Pacelle, president of the Humane Society of the United States (HSUS).  Jolley asked Pacelle if the recent HSUS lawsuit against the pork checkoff program was "legal shenanigans" or a substantial case.  Pacelle's response noted some recent reporting on the U.S. Food Policy blog.

Warner left no doubts about the NPPC position. Let me ask the question posed in my column directly to you: “Does HSUS have a case against the National Pork Board or are they just engaging in some legal shenanigans in order to force NPB to the bargaining table?”

A: You can read our complaints. We have (hard evidence) that the Pork Board used check-off funds to participate in NPPC lobbying events. NPPC says the charges are baseless, yet it quickly acted to remove evidence of the Board’s high-donor “Partner” status in its Alliance lobbying program. Within days of the HSUS complaint, the U.S. Food Policy blog reported that the Pork Board had been (removed) from the Alliance website.

HSUS and pork farmers also filed a (complaint) over the $60 million pay-out from the Pork Board to the NPPC for the use of the ‘Pork: The Other White Meat’ slogan. NPPC used $500 million from the checkoff to make the slogan successful, so producers should not have to pay again for it, especially in light of the slogan being put to bed.

Pork alliance removes National Pork Board from Alliance Partners list

U.S. Food Policy reported on Wednesday that the National Pork Board (a federal checkoff program) was listed as an Alliance Partner on the website of the Pork Alliance, a lobbying entity sponsored by the National Pork Producers Council (a private-sector trade association).

It is against the law for federal checkoff funds to be used for lobbying.

I see today that the Pork Alliance website no longer lists the National Pork Board.  The alliance must have removed the board from the list in the past 3 days, after a complaint was filed by the Humane Society of the United States.

Here, for the historical record, is my screen capture from last Wednesday (click the image for a higher-resolution view).  The National Pork Board appears right below Merck Animal Health.

Pork checkoff funds lobbying alliance

The federal government's semi-public checkoff programs collect mandatory assessments from producers.  Of course, it is illegal to use these funds for lobbying.

Yet, the National Pork Board (the pork checkoff program), overseen by USDA's Agricultural Marketing Service, is listed as an "Alliance Partner" for a National Pork Producer Council lobbying organization.  The NPPC is a private-sector pork industry trade association.  The NPPC's alliance web page explains the lobbying goal:

Pork Alliance dues are used to fund outreach for critical legislative and regulatory industry priorities, including foreign trade access, environment, food safety and animal welfare issues.

The dues mentioned in the web page are large.  The application form (.pdf) on the NPPC website says that the dues for becoming an "Alliance Partner" are $20,000.

I am not surprised that the Humane Society of the United States (HSUS) has filed a legal complaint with the USDA Inspector General.  The mandatory assessments are being funneled to a lobbying organization.  No matter what you think of the HSUS, it seems wrong for the federal government to use its power of taxation to place a finger on the scale of the public debate.

Upcoming event: Hack // Meat on Dec 7-9

During a period of time when food policy-making at the federal level seems nearly dysfunctional -- witness the continued absence of a farm bill! -- I have been reflecting on innovations in the private sector and in civil society.

Just for example, here is the announcement for an upcoming event in New York City:

Mark your calendar! From December 7 – 9, Food+Tech Connect, GRACE Communications and Applegate are bringing together technologists, entrepreneurs, creatives, policy experts, non-profit leaders and industry executives for Hack//Meat, the first-ever “meat hackathon” in New York City.

Over the course of the weekend, “steakholders” will work with teams to rapidly prototype innovative solutions to business and consumer education challenges in the way meat is produced, processed, distributed, sold and consumed. Our goal? We want to bring together the best and brightest minds to develop technologies and tools that help democratize meat. Some of the areas we will be tackling include:

Production: Develop tools to help small and medium sized ranchers more efficiently and sustainably manage their herds, process their meat and sell direct to consumers or wholesale buyers.

Health: Reimagine how technology can eliminate or minimize antibiotic use and improve animal health.

Processing: Design ways for processors to more easily demonstrate that they are complying with federal regulations, manage processing demand and access financing.

Distribution: Streamline the process of selling “non-choice” cuts of meat, and improve the efficiency and financial viability of getting meat from farm to buyer.

Foodservice: Make it easier and more affordable for restaurants and foodservice to source sustainable ingredients, as well as to manage supplier adherence to worker and animal welfare.

Consumption: Improve consumer insight research and education on the benefits of sustainable meat and nose-to-tail cooking.

Developers, designers, gamers, marketers, storytellers, academics, farmers, butchers, restaurateurs, policy experts and anyone who is in the business of meat is invited to participate. As always, you can be sure to expect great food, lots of learning and invaluable new connections. We also want to make sure teams are able to actualize your prototypes, so we’re offering cash prizes and consulting services to winning hacks.

Visit the Hack//Meat website to learn more about the event and for updates on additional prizes and judges. You can register for the event here.

Lawsuit challenges pork board purchase of "Other White Meat" slogan

A lawsuit filed today in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia charges that the $60 million sale of the pork industry's "Other White Meat" slogan illegally diverts money to the lobbying efforts of the National Pork Producers Council (NPPC).

One of the plaintiffs is Harvey Dillenburg, a pork producer in Adair County, Iowa.  Mr. Dillenburg is not a member of the NPPC.  He is required by law to pay a portion of every sale to the National Pork Board, which is supposed to use the money for promotions and advertising.  The National Pork Board is not allowed to lobby.  In 2006, the National Pork Board agreed to pay the NPPC $60 million in return for the property rights to the "Other White Meat" brand.  The resulting payments of $3 million per year for 20 years help fund the NPPC's powerful lobbying machine.

Think about how this arrangement looks from the point of view of Mr. Dillenburg.  Although he does not choose to support the NPPC, the federal government forces him along with all other pork producers to pay the National Pork Board, which in turn pays the NPPC.

The other plaintiff is the Humane Society of the United States, a leading animal welfare organization.  As the Congressional Research Service (.pdf) explains, the HSUS recently brokered a successful agreement with egg producers, reaching a judicious compromise about what type of cages seem ethically acceptable for hens.  Although the leading trade association for egg producers is now working with HSUS to get this balanced policy approved by Congress, the agreement faces implacable opposition from the NPPC.  The egg agreement causes no harm to pork producers, but the NPPC is worried that the precedent of a successful egg agreement will generate unrealistic hopes for similar good-faith negotiations about gestation crates for pork.  It is not surprising that HSUS has been looking into how the federal government's pork board -- which is not supposed to support lobbying -- helps fund the NPPC's efforts to spoil the egg agreement.

This blog, U.S. Food Policy, began covering the tale of the "Other White Meat" sale in a June 2006 blog post, which called for greater transparency about the terms of the sale.  When nobody would give me the documents voluntarily, I filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request.  USDA initially turned down my request, arguing that the information was "pre-decisional and deliberative".  When I appealed, USDA's Agricultural Marketing Service in December 2006 released partly-blacked out versions of the key documents.

Although AMS hid critical details, enough information was revealed in 2006 to suggest that this was a poor use of pork producers' money.  For example, I pointed out accounting flaws in the supposedly independent appraisal upon which the $60 million sale price was based.  In the HSUS and Dillenburg lawsuit today, I learned for the first time that Mark Williams, who is largely responsible for pulling together the supposedly independent price appraisals, actually has been responsible for developing the "Other White Meat" branding since its inception. 

The HSUS explains further:

Through months of research, The HSUS uncovered glaring legal violations, conflicts of interest, and an exorbitantly over-inflated $60 million price tag associated with the deal. Much of the extraordinarily inflated value of the slogan resulted from 20 years of promotional campaigns funded entirely with pork producers’ own checkoff funds: roughly half a billion dollars. In essence, NPPC charged pork producers twice: once to make The Other White Meat successful, and again to pay for the value of that success.

Now, the case against this sale has only gotten stronger.  The National Pork Board has largely retired the "Other White Meat" slogan, in favor of the new "Be Inspired" slogan, and yet the pork board continues to pay the NPPC $3 million each year for the nearly worthless old slogan.  The NPB has an escape clause allowing it to cancel the payments, but it chooses not to exercise this clause.

The HSUS and Dillenburg lawsuit (.pdf) is well written, with astonishing details beyond what can be described in this space.  It was covered today in Feedstuffs and other trade publications.  I encourage everybody interested in U.S. Food Policy to read it in full.

Federal policy and the McRib

The McDonald's McRib is back in the news again. A mocking Twitter feed is under way.  Now is a good time to revisit the federal government's role in this industrial concoction, a perfect symbol of a food system gone mad.

The McRib was originally developed with support from the federal government's pork checkoff program.  Of all the things this federal program has accomplished over the decades, the McRib deserves mention right up front.  The National Pork Board's 2006 annual report (.pdf) boasted in its first paragraph:

The Pork Checkoff celebrated 20 years of progress in 2006. Taking a look back and reflecting on where we are today, I am reminded of the impact that the Pork Checkoff has had on the industry, such as moving from being a net importer of pork to one of the largest exporters of pork in the world; creating new products like the very successful McRib; developing education programs such as Pork Quality Assurance™ to help producers ensure consumers of a safe, wholesome product; and repositioning pork from a second thought to top-of-mind awareness.

The pork checkoff program sometimes is mistaken for a private sector trade association.  It is not.  Like all the federal checkoffs, it uses the federal government's power of taxation to collect a mandatory assessment or tax from all pork producers, whether they voluntarily want to pay or not.  The checkoff is managed by the National Pork Board, whose members are appointed by the Secretary of Agriculture.  Program oversight is provided by USDA's Agricultural Marketing Service.  Every marketing message is approved by the federal government, with official status as "government speech."

The McRib stands for the proposition that the federal government should help the pork industry promote any product, no matter how contrary to the government's own dietary guidance efforts in the midst of an epidemic of overweight and chronic disease.

Here is the nutrition facts panel, with 450 Calories, 40% of a day's saturated fat, 37% of a day's sodium, and an overall grade of "D" from Caloriecount.

I can understand why McDonald's wants to market this kind of stuff.  I am sure it is profitable.  But, why can't the federal government exercise more discretion in its own choice of products for the federal checkoff programs?  Isn't there anybody in the whole chain of oversight for the pork checkoff who is embarrassed to be associated with the McRib?

Data from Denmark on antibiotics for hogs

Denmark several years ago banned non-therapeutic use of antibiotics in livestock and poultry.  This policy allows veterinarians to use antibiotics on animals who need the treatment, but it prevents the use of antibiotics in much larger quantities merely for growth promotion [Update: this post revised slightly to reflect that the ban affected all livestock and poultry, not just hogs].  Non-therapeutic use, which is common in the United States, threatens the future health of both farm animals and humans as microbes become resistant to the powerful medicines.  The Danish experience shows that the ban on non-therapeutic use worked just fine.

Ralph Loglisci of the Center for a Livable Future reports at Grist and the CLF blog.

The editors of Scientific American recently encouraged U.S. hog farmers to "follow Denmark and stop giving farm animals low-dose antibiotics." Sixteen years ago, in order to reduce the threat of increased development of antibiotic resistant bacteria in their food system and the environment, Denmark phased in an antibiotic growth promotant ban in food animal production. Guess what? According to Denmark's Ministry of Food, Agriculture and Fisheries the ban is working and the industry has continued to thrive. The government agency found that Danish livestock and poultry farmers used 37 percent less antibiotics in 2009 than in 1994, leading to overall reductions of antimicrobial resistance countrywide.

Notice that the Danish ban is not a radical propopsal. It still allows a large amount of antibiotic use, as needed, and this therapeutic use has grown proportionately as the Danish industry has thrived and grown since the ban. What the ban accomplished was getting rid of the worst excesses in previous years. It is a sign of dysfunction in the American political system that similar proposals have been blocked here.

Source: CLF blog.  Click if needed for larger image.

New "Be Inspired" brand for pork is unlikely to completely replace "the Other White Meat"

The federal government's promotion program for pork this month launched a new slogan for pork advertisements, "Be Inspired."  The new slogan largely -- but not entirely -- replaces the previous slogan, "Pork. The Other White Meat."

The Associated Press coverage on March 4 emphasized the bad news for the former slogan:

The Other White Meat" has another slogan.

The National Pork Board on Friday replaced the decades-old ad campaign with a new message: "Pork: Be Inspired."

Board officials said after nearly 25 years, it was time to move on from the old message that compared pork to chicken and instead try to increase sales by focusing on the estimated 82 million Americans who already eat pork.

Both the old and new advertisements are funded by the National Pork Board, which is a "checkoff" program established by Congress in 1985 to support pork research and promotion.  The board's $60 million annual budget is collected using federal taxation authority through a mandatory assessment on pork producers.  [Update: Following two sentences have been revised in response to the first comment.]  The board provides millions of dollars each year under subcontracts to the National Pork Producers Council, the industry's largest private-sector trade association.  The USDA Office of the Inspector General (.pdf) wrote in 1999 that the National Pork Board "needs to improve accountability for the funds and regain control over the National Pork Producers Association's (NPPC) influence on the Board's business," which led to increased efforts in the 2000s to maintain an arm's length relationship between the two entities.

It is easy to see why the National Pork Board might have been dissatisfied with the 20-year-old Other White Meat slogan.  During the years the slogan was used, chicken (broiler) consumption soared while pork consumption stagnated, even though there is no federal checkoff program for chicken as there is for pork and beef.  These trends were highlighted in an analysis prepared by the National Pork Board to justify the new campaign, which was approved by USDA's Agricultural Marketing Service in December, 2010.

The analysis pointed out that the old Other White Meat brand was targeted at light users of pork.  This audience was not enough to achieve the remarkably ambitious objective in the National Pork Board's new strategic plan: "a 10 percent increase in real per capita domestic consumer expenditures for pork."

For such a sharp increase in pork demand, the new campaign will have to promote major increases in consumption by a target audience that is more heavily into pork.  The new target audience is described in the National Pork Board analysis as "the flavor-seeking creative," people who enjoy cooking and "love a good meal -- with various proteins at the center, plus delicious sides."  The target group is "aware of fat and sodium, but doesn’t let that stop them from enjoying pork."

Despite what news reports implied, the documents from the National Pork Board say that the program is not abandoning the Other White Meat brand. You can still see the old brand way down in the bottom right corner of the pork board's website, described as a "Our Heritage Brand."

It would have been awkward for the checkoff program to abandon the old brand entirely, given that the National Pork Board committed to using $60 million in farmers' checkoff payments to buy the rights to use the Other White Meat slogan from the National Pork Producers Council less than five years ago.

At the time of this sale, I asked questions about the appraisal that was used to determine this sum, but neither USDA nor the National Pork Board would release the information.  The documents I received under a Freedom of Information Act request were blacked out to remove the most important information. The information about the appraisal that was visible in the documents justified the $60 million estimate on the grounds that, without this purchase, the National Pork Board would have to invest in developing a new slogan from scratch.  The reason now seems especially dubious, as the board invests in the launch of the new "Be Inspired" slogan.

In 2006, USDA said the $60 million payment to the National Pork Producers Council would be made in intallments of $3 million per year for 20 years. It might be politic for the pork checkoff program to retain that "heritage brand" in the lower right-hand corner for many years to come.

McWilliams and locavores

I will certainly read it, but, from the title, I'm not really looking forward to James McWilliams' new book, Just Food: Where Locavores Get It Wrong and How We Can Truly Eat Responsibly.

In a recent radio interview, McWilliams really objected to a certain kind of strictly dogmatic 100-mile-circle type food discipline. That seems like a true and fairly bland point. It would be good environmentalism if Americans ate food that has less processing, less meat, and comes from closer to home, on average, but that doesn't mean all food should come from right nearby.

In the meanwhile, Kerry Trueman's review at Eating Liberally certainly was fun. The lead sentence describes the book as "the literary equivalent of a turd blossom, the Texan term for a flower that pops up out of a cow patty."

Kerry reminds the reader of McWilliams' credulous New York Times piece about a study of trichinosis in free-range pork, which was the subject of an editor's note acknowledging that the study's Pork Board funding should have been mentioned.

She gives examples of McWilliams' "pointless ponderings": "What would happen to local traffic patterns if every consumer in Austin made daily trips in their SUVs to visit small local farms to buy locally produced food?" Hmm. I guess I never really wondered that. But, if I had, I would have agreed it was a bad idea.

And, generously, she draws out "the needle in McWilliams' hyperbolic, straw man-stuffed haystack." She says McWilliams' criticism of current meat consumption patterns hits home more strongly than does his caricature of locavores: "McWilliams evidently made the calculus that it would be more lucrative to demonize farmers' market fanatics than mindless meat eaters, but his opportunistic posturing ultimately overwhelms the more thoughtful analyses contained in this book."

I'm just glad McWilliams relented on the originally planned subtitle for the book: "How Locavores Are Endangering The Future of Food." With that title, I would have felt free to skip the book altogether.

Who's hogging our antibiotics?

According to the new ad campaign from the Pew Charitable Trusts,

Here are the facts:

Up to 70 percent of U.S. antibiotics go to farm animals that aren't sick, to offset overcrowding and poor sanitation. This practice promotes the development of deadly strains of drug-resistant bacteria that can spread to humans.

Consumers are exposed to resistant bacteria through the handling and consumption of contaminated meat, through produce that has been exposed to resistant bacteria in soil and water, or even through direct contact with the bacteria in the environment.

Antibiotic-resistant infections cost the U.S. health care system at least $4 to $5 billion per year. One reason is the misuse of antibiotics on factory farms, which promotes the development of drug-resistant diseases.

Each year 325,000 hospitalizations and 5,000 deaths occur due to people eating food contaminated by dangerous pathogens and bacteria such as Salmonella and E. Coli, which are often antibiotic resistant.

Food-borne bacteria are more dangerous in their antibiotic-resistant forms, because they are harder to treat and may require multiple antibiotic treatments, longer hospital stays and other interventions before finally being eliminated.

Noticed on the Beyond Green blog.