Self-regulation in food and
beverage marketing is being exploited and
is failing to curb childhood obesity, research
by a global obesity taskforce has found.
The International Obesity Taskforce said some
Internet sites that attracted children with
advertising games were being used to bypass
stricter advertising standards in traditional
media, the 10th International Congress on Obesity
in Sydney heard.
The taskforce found that 85 percent of businesses
advertising to children on television also
had interactive Web sites for them.
It said 12.2 million children had visited
commercial Web sites promoting food and beverages
over a three-month monitoring period in 2005.
An analysis of this marketing found that
food and beverage advertisers paid lip service
to advertising codes of conduct. It said some
Web sites pressure children to purchase before
they played online games.
"Viral marketing downloads and links from
'advergames' to corporate Web sites were against
the spirit of the self-regulation system's
provisions," researchers at Britain's Middlesex
University in said.
"While it is relatively easy to control the
content of television and print advertising,
controlling the content on online advertising
and 'advergames' ... is a lot more complex."
The taskforce has said an epidemic of obesity,
now estimated at 1.5 billion people worldwide,
has led to more type 2 diabetes in obese children.
"At the moment the need to protect children
from commercial exploitation was being largely
overlooked by the food and advertising industries,"
said Boyd Swinburn, president of the Australasian
Society for the Study of Obesity.
"We need to recognize that everyone in society
has a responsibility to ensure we provide
healthy environments for children," Swinburn
told
CITIES AT FAULT
The week-long conference also heard that
many children were "victims of poor urban
designs" that discourage outdoor activity.
"Many aspects of the physical environment
present barriers to children from being outside
and directly contribute to their declining
levels of physical activity," said Dr Jo Salmon,
Senior Research Fellow in the School of Exercise
and Nutrition Sciences at Deakin University
in the Australian state of Victoria.
"Small changes to urban design such as age-appropriate
playground equipment ... could have a significant
impact on overall activity levels across the
day," she told the conference.
Salmon said parental security and safety
concerns that kept children at home were also
limiting the physical activities of children
and contributing to obesity.
She said her research found 70 percent of
five- to six-year-olds and 80 percent of 10-
to 12-year-olds exceeded the recommended two-hour
daily limit for Internet and television entertainment.
"Children who know their neighbors and have
strong social networks within their neighborhood
are much more likely to be active," she said.
