But it\u2019s our fault, right? We keep buying these edible substances despite health nags telling us they are making us overweight and sick.<\/p>\n
Half of our energy intake in Australia comes from UPFs, mostly in the form of ready meals, packaged bread, cereals and soft drinks. Less than five per cent of us<\/a> eat enough fruit and vegetables.<\/p>\n If only we exercised a little more willpower and made better choices in our lives, two-thirds of our country wouldn\u2019t be obese or overweight<\/a>. And we wouldn\u2019t be weighing down the hospital system with cases of type 2 diabetes, hypertension, cardiovascular disease, chronic kidney disease, Crohn\u2019s disease and depression.<\/p>\n Except we\u2019re a convenient scapegoat.<\/p>\n If consumers are the problem then corporations can go on their merry way, creating products that are, from an evolutionary perspective, entirely foreign to our bodies and causing them harm.<\/p>\n Deflecting blame is just one strategy food companies use.<\/p>\n Today, three of the biggest food corporations (Coca-Cola, PepsiCo and Mondelez) spend $13.5 billion on advertising every year, four times the entire operating budget of the World Health Organisation.<\/p>\n And a surprising amount of thought and effort goes into designing foods that keep our confused bodies craving more as they seek nourishment from non-existent nutrients<\/a>.<\/p>\n All the flavour profiles that our bodies instinctively associate with various nutrients are there. Only it\u2019s a sensory illusion.<\/p>\n That UPFs are also often soft, are hyper-palatable, and never satiate us makes overeating easy, adds Deakin University\u2019s Dr Priscila Machado.<\/p>\n Loading<\/p>\n \u201cWe designed food to be irresistible. Now we\u2019re taking medicine to resist it,\u201d futurist and author Mike Lee writes<\/a>.<\/p>\n As the industry has grown, and our waists have grown alongside it, industry leaders envision capturing more than just market share. They want to capture our diets, our stomach, and mouth share too.<\/p>\n To illustrate this idea, the authors of the new three-part Lancet series<\/a> on Ultra-Processed Foods and Human Health, give this example:<\/p>\n \u201cIn 1986, Roberto Goizueta, then president and chief executive officer of Coca-Cola, outlined his vision to investors:<\/p>\n \u201c\u2018Right now in the [USA], people consume more soft drinks than any other liquid, including ordinary tap water. If we take full advantage of our opportunities \u2026 we will see the same wave catching on in market after market until, eventually, the number one beverage on earth will be … soft drinks \u2013 our soft drinks.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n The Lancet series highlights that interest groups funded by leading corporations<\/a> also work relentlessly to block regulation and create conditions that allow them to expand.<\/p>\n In 2024, of the 326 lobbyists employed by the US food and beverage industry, 211 were former government employees; Australia\u2019s Health Star Ratings system, developed in partnership with industry, gives many UPFs high ratings, suggesting that it has been co-opted as a marketing tool<\/a>; while systematic reviews on soft drinks and obesity risk were five times more likely to show no association with obesity if industry-sponsored.<\/p>\n All this is to say, the problem is not you or us. It\u2019s them.<\/p>\n \u201cFor a long time the problem has been framed as a matter of individual responsibility,\u201d said Phillip Baker, an author in the Lancet series.<\/p>\n \u201cWe offer an alternative interpretation of the problem, describing the root causes as the rising power of the UPF industry to shape food systems in ways that generate ultra-processed diets.\u201d<\/p>\n We can, of course, try our best to avoid UPFs in their shiny plastic packaging and with ingredients we wouldn\u2019t use at home. But it misses the point that it is the food industry that has become bloated \u2013 obese, even \u2013 with greed.<\/p>\n The 43 global experts, including Australians, have ideas<\/a> about how to fix the food environment we find ourselves in. They include marketing restrictions; sugar and UPF taxes; restricting the available foods in retail spaces; and improving school food policies.<\/p>\n