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Friday 8 February 2008

RAPID ROUNDUP: Call for ban on TV junk food advertising to children – experts respond

The South Australian Health Minister has called on all states to ban junk food TV advertising during children’s television viewing times. Several experts respond below.

Feel free to use these quotes in your stories.  If you need assistance tracking down an expert, contact the AusSMC on 08 8207 7415. 

Professor Louise Baur is an expert in childhood obesity in the Department of Paediatrics and Child Health at the University of Sydney.

“I really applaud this effort and think it shows tremendous leadership from the SA Government. I would like to encourage all states and the Federal government to take this issue seriously. There is no doubt that excessive intake of high fat, high sugar foods is causing greater levels of obesity. There is also no doubt that junk foods are marketed to children at a much higher rate than healthy foods and that TV advertising influences children’s awareness of products and household purchasing patterns.

However there is a broader moral issue here. We need to think about our moral obligation to ensure children grow up with good health and well being. This requires a broader strategy that looks at other forms of advertising as well, such as 'advergaming' where companies selling unhealthy foods produce fun games and activities for children via the internet. Regulation of junk food advertising on TV is just the beginning.”

More information can be found on the website of the NSW Centre for Overweight & Obesity.

Associate Professor Elizabeth Handsley is an expert in film and literature classification, children’s media and obesity in the School of Law at Flinders University. In 2005-2006 she conducted an international study into the regulation of food advertising to children.

“Anything that restricts the amount of junk food advertising that children see is good. However, we know that children’s viewing time is not restricted to the time when so-called children’s programmes are shown. Thus this kind of regulation will probably have only a limited impact on the amount and type of advertising kids are exposed to. The concept of a children’s programme needs to be defined carefully as the category is not clear-cut. Many people would consider a programme like 'The Simpsons' to be more for adults than children and yet we know that children love to watch it. Is this enough to make it a 'children's programme'? Similarly, many children watch TV at the same time as adults and this peaks at around 7 pm in the evening, which is not during children’s programming.

For such regulation to work we have to be much clearer about what constitutes a children’s programme in terms of which programmes children actually watch rather than a rigid classification. A lot more attention needs to be paid to the development of an overarching strategy that reviews the content of advertising during all potential viewing times rather than just the volume of junk food advertising during particular programmes.”