Opinion
The profit from obesity
30 July 2008
by Jonathan Wells
SciDev.net


Pelotas is a South Brazilian city of marked economic contrasts. At the roadside, thin ponies pull battered carts past bicycles. Along the thoroughfare, motorcycles and smart new cars zoom past them. Some people live in shacks made from plastic bags, others in mansions with yachts moored at their garden's edge.

Away from the city centre, small stores still offer cheap staples and vegetables. But closer to the centre, a large supermarket has opened, with an escalator leading up from the car park.

This city – where I contribute to epidemiological research on obesity – is also undergoing a marked nutritional transition. In Brazil, between 1973 and 1996, obesity increased from 2.4 to 6.9 per cent in men and from 7.0 to 12.5 per cent in women.

The why and the how

In simple terms, obesity arises when people consume more energy than they expend, either by eating too much or exercising too little. But obesity remains difficult to counter, and hundreds of research papers have been written on tackling it, mostly from high-income countries.

Such studies can easily measure dietary intake, physical activity, and obesity status by simple methods (questionnaires, measuring weight and height) or, nowadays, with sophisticated state-of-the-art body movement recorders and stable isotope probes. Yet obesity becomes ever more prevalent.

It's undoubtedly true that economic and cultural transitions affect dietary intake and activity levels. If we measure these changing circumstances, we can see the impact of the growing 'obesogenic niche' – the sum total of environmental factors which collectively predispose to excess weight gain.
The problem is that such research risks being simply a witness to the process, telling us what is happening without explaining why. For scientists, the 'why' should be just as important as the 'how'.

Commercial cunning

What is really driving the obesity epidemic is not increased dietary intake, or decreased activity levels, but the web of economic strategies and commercial interests that cause individual people to change or maintain certain behaviours.

The way industry understands and manipulates individuals' behaviour is fundamental to the growth of the obesogenic niche. Heads of industry would probably argue that they are not trying to create an obesity epidemic. Nevertheless, there are enormous profits to be had from obesity.

The foods that maximise profit just happen to be those high in sugar or fat. They are cheap to produce, easy to brand and market, and easy to stock in supermarket aisles. And there are numerous ways to encourage people who are pre-obese to buy these foods.

Sedentary behaviour is also profitable, and encouraged by industry. A moped is more glamorous than a bicycle. A new computer game will re-invigorate peoples' interest, but not their bodies.

http://www.cosmosmagazine.com/features/online/2106/the-profit-obesity