Food industry conflicts of interest: Strategies of the Spanish food and drink industries to undermine public Health

Abstract

Ultra-processed food and drink industries are one of the major drivers of the world epidemic of obesity and non-communicable diseases (NCDs), through the production, intensive marketing, and wide availability of energy dense nutritionally poor (EDNP) food and drinks (1). While fresh and perishable whole or minimally processed foods are healthier, most of the food and drink industries profits come from increasing consumption of ENDP products, making their interest irreconcilable with public health objectives (2). It is not surprising, then, that those industries deploy strategies to undermine public health policies and interventions aimed to reduce the consumption of EDNP products. I am going to outline the main strategies used, as described in the literature, and show how they are undermining the public health efforts to tackle the epidemic of obesity and NCDs in Spain.