Should food advertising be banned?

A chocolate candy with wings, legs, and super large glasses is rushed off the toy train and falls down. Oh, pleasure. It says a voice next about a game where you can get free access to a children's amusement park. This commercial for sugar products is broadcast on the afternoon program of German television.

If it had been for the Green Chem quezdemir, this ad would have been banned shortly. The German minister of food asks from 6:00 to 11:00, on television, radio and internet not to show unhealthy food ads aimed at attracting children's attention.

This should also apply to Influencer in YouTube or Tiktek. In addition, there must be the taboo of plates making bright - colored advertisements for sweet, fat, or salty foods around schools, kindergartens, and playgrounds in the future.

We have to make sure our children grow healthier, says ãozdemir during his Berlin plans presentation. This is crucial in the fight against overweight and other dietary diseases. It has been proven that advertising about unhealthy foods affects the way children eat, the minister further says.

Market of Billions

But for the ban on advertising to prevent overweight, it is opposed by representatives of Germany's food industry. So for example, Carsten Bernoth, director general of the German Sugar Product Industry Association, (BDSI). To hold an interview with Deutsche Welle, he sits at the table in the BDSI conference room in Bonn. There are no cookies or candy on the table, but only a few bottles of water.

The ban on advertising will not cause children to eat less sugar products, says Bernoth: “The advertising is important in the market economy. It works in order to take part of the market. Confeit producers in Germany last year had a business volume of 14 billion euros. And about a billion euros they give for advertising.

Bernoth fears the plans of ãozdemir will cause a complete ban on advertising in his sector. Because even advertising designed to be seen by adults can be seen by children, so that even these may be included in the planned ban on advertising. We demand that consumers and consumers be free to choose, says Bernoth. “They must make conscious decisions. Information and knowledge are the key to that. And it's not for the state to make specifications, to make prohibitions.

Positive Example Chile 

What is true: Can the ban on advertising protect children from the use of unhealthy food, can it not? We call Annette Buyken, Public Food Professor “Public Health Nutrition” at the University of Paderborn. The data on this question is not enough, she tells DW. The main problem is that there are few countries that take measures and associate them with studying their effects. ”

As a positive example, she mentions Chile. There, since 2016, the world's strictest rules have been made regarding the use of sugar products to appeal to children. In addition to the ban on advertising, unhealthy foods should have a warning sign, as is done in cigarettes. The package records the effects or damage these foods can have. Thus it is seen that this is how the selection of foods used” has changed, says Buyken.

Efforts are now being made to see if health improves in the long term. The focus should not be on overweight. Most important is to start, observe, and make needed adjustments. We have enough evidence from experience with Chile and other countries of how this can be done.

In many countries the number of overweight children has increased greatly. According to the Robert Koch Institute in Germany, one in six children is overweight or obese. At 11 to 13 years of age, the figures are even one in five.

Corona Pandemia has increased the tendency 

The parents of such children call Andrew Gerschlawer and ask for help. Since 2018 she has been a food specialist. In her council office on a medical ambulance in Bonn, the German Food Association (DGE) is suspended, in the corner there is a toy kitchen for children, a pyramid and nutrition is attached to the board: the base of the pyramid is with a lot of unscrewd drinks, lots of vegetables and fruit, valuable products of cereals and potatoes, mass milk, meat, fish, and eggs -- slightly sweet and fat.

Gerschlauer puts his drinking card on the table “Durstlöscher” in his hand. According to the picture, this lemonade will quench your thirst. Tell me how much sugar this drink contains, ask Gerschlauer and give the answer itself: “18 spoons. This does not satisfy only the thirst. That's the promise that wants to blow my eyes like a consumer.

Gerschlauer hopes that the ban on unhealthy foods will soon arrive in Germany. Since Corona's pandemic, she has observed that some children have increased relatively much weight in a short period, she says. I see there's a connection, because kids have seen more TV. TV is often eaten when it is watching TV. And when advertising comes, it's hard for kids not to think about candy. More affected are children from families with social weaknesses.

Gerschlauer contrasts internal and external factors that make man decide to eat. A major role, of course, is the environment - primarily the family, where parents who have daily responsibilities are taken as role bosses. But I am convinced that the very brain of young children can also be influenced by advertising. I myself am now able to say slogans from the age of childhood, which was 50 years ago. Such things remain in mind.

Other measures must be taken after the ban on advertising, Gerschlauer says. For example, high taxation of unhealthy food, like it was for cigarettes. Or lowering the value added tax on foods that have a healthier effect, such as vegetables, fruit, integral flour products, and legumes. Otherwise, after 30 years we'll face a big problem. When these overweight children reach adulthood, then they will be with heart disease and circulation, type 2 diabetes, and other food - related diseases. So we're going to face a lot of suffering and high costs.

Opposition From Liberals 

But the ban on advertising that has been proposed by ⇩ will have difficulty getting votes in parliament, although the coalition government has principledly agreed on the government contract to ban unhealthy food advertising in emissions and forms of age 14. From the coalition partners' faction, FDP liberals, dealt with the proposal as a question. Because it means more bureaucracy, more bans, less innovations and less quality life, writes Gero Hocker on Twitter, spokesman for FDP's agrarian affairs in parliament.

What do children and youths in Germany think about the planned ban on advertising? When you ask your children at kindergarten and elementary school, or your children, then you get the impression that you meet a strong sugar lobby. But many older ones also dislike being given rules in matters of nutrition.

Lunch cakes for school students 

So for example, some teenage youths who enjoy their lunch break on this sunny March day in the southern neighborhood of the city of Bonn. They rush into the school yard, cross the street, and enter the store. A little later, they come out of there and come back carrying cookies, lemons, and candies.

Noah, 18, separates from the group and goes to the corner, he doesn't have candy. I think unhealthy food advertising should be banned, he tells Deutsche Welle. “Man needs to look at and see how many people are overweight today, I see this thing every day at school. The young man in the black jacket has no time, the lesson begins again. I'm in sports. I try to avoid sweeties, he tells Deutsche Welle. For example, chocolate canisters like advertising. Because they taste like fun, but they're made of 52 percent sugar.