On September 30, 2001 the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) lost its first court battle (Physician’s Committee for Responsible Medicine, www.pcrm.org/magazine/GMO1Winter/GMO1Win4.html). This loss drew attention to the influence of the beef, dairy, and egg industries in the creation of federal food guidelines and policies. U.S. District Court Judge James Robertson ruled that the USDA violated federal law by withholding documents revealing bias and illegal conflicts of interest among members of its advisory panel—who had direct financial ties to these three industries.

Why should this be of concern to you and me? It is because the UDSA advisory panel helps to determine the U.S. food guidelines. From these guidelines, billions of dollars are spent on federal food programs for prisons, Meals-on-Wheels, Women-Infant-Children [WIC], public school lunch programs, and also for federally funded advertising campaigns for the beef, dairy, and egg industries.

Six of the eleven advisory board members (a voting majority) had direct financial ties to the beef, dairy, and egg industries, which profit enormously from government-spending programs related to food. These persons were in a position to cooperate with each other for profit, rather than to keep the public's best interests at heart. According to relevant scientific information and other facts presented in this case, they did not keep our best interests at heart, but conspired together to get gain at our expense.

More than 65 years ago these industries gained direct access to public schools, placing in every classroom beautifully colored posters of the basic food groups—telling us what and how to eat, and heavily promoting their industries. Many people will instantly recognize and remember these posters. Because it was in public school, we trusted the information.

Today these “government” guidelines are included in every nutrition textbook used in our public schools and colleges. This exposure, combined with billions of tax-payer dollars spent on repetitive advertising, has resulted in a widespread acceptance of biased and false nutritional information. Misinformation has worked its way into the American consciousness to create powerful beliefs that move us to make the food choices that we make.

Misleading information has been published and distributed to the public with an aim to cloud the truth in order to protect, favor, and expand market shares and the economic interests of the beef, dairy, and egg industries, who presently profit greatly from our national mindset toward nutrition (Campbell, T. Colin, PhD, The China Study, pp 290-303).

In 2002, the Food and Nutrition Board of the National Academy of the Sciences published an interesting report. Their policies also help to establish the nutritional guidelines used for school-lunch programs, hospital food, prison food, WIC, etc. The following advice was on the front page of their newly published study:

To meet the body's daily energy and nutritional needs while minimizing risk for chronic disease, adults should get 45% to 65% of their calories from carbohydrates, 20% to 35% from fat and 10% to 35% from protein….added sugars should comprise no more than 25% of the calories consumed….added sugars are those incorporated into foods and beverages during production [and] major sources include candy, soft drinks, fruit drinks, pastries, other sweets, and most all ultra-processed foods.

At one time public money was used to fund all such reports; however, industry has found it to be advantageous to help fund such studies and to provide funding to decision makers who ultimately authorize such reports. In just such a manner, a consortium of soft-drink companies, M&M Mars Candy Company, and other industry giants helped to fund this study. These included the Dannon Institute, a leading dairy-based consortium, and the International Life Sciences Institute (ILSI), which is a group that represents the interests of about fifty food, supplement, and drug companies, including Burger King, Coca-Cola, Nestle, Pfizer and Roche drugs and vitamins, and many others (Campbell, T. Colin, PhD, The China Study, pp 311-314). Additionally, there were other drug companies that sponsored the report directly.

The reported recommendations of this study are alarming to scientists who have spent lifetimes researching nutrition and have published findings that run counter to this report's recommendations. Similar to the USDA, the National Academy of the Sciences has also produced food intake recommendations that demonstrate their conflict of interest, or unholy alliance with industry. It has discredited itself and has set the stage for horrific food programs for schools, hospitals, food stamp programs, and for programs serving the less fortunate.

At nearly the same time this 2002 report was produced, the independently funded World Health Organization (WHO) produced a report that said the maximum amount of refined sugar should never exceed 10 percent of caloric intake. While even this is too high, how could two entities produce such contrasting reports, if the same corpus of scientific data is available to both? The sugar industry threatened the World Health Organization’s report and used strong-arm tactics trying to force the WHO to change the 10 percent maximum to 25 percent, threatening that if it didn't, they would use their influence in the U.S. Congress to disrupt 406 million in annual U.S. funding to the WHO (Bowery, S., “Sugar Industry Threatens to Scupper WHO”, The National Guardian, April 21, 2003).

As you can see, in the United States both political and financial powers have combined to control the flow of dietary information. This has been done to control and expand market shares, to meet personal political objectives, and to protect the interests of certain industries, rather than to promote the health and welfare of the citizens of our nation. The payoff includes government food contracts worth billions, political support for politicians, and monopolistic protection provided to certain industries.

Follow the money; companies with the most to gain mold and bankroll the reports, fund biased research, and even provide the educational tools in our public schools, universities, and medical schools. The control of information is paid for by those who stand to profit the most by it. This has led to the favoring of industry giants in the formation of U.S. food recommendations, rather than favoring pure and unadulterated truth.