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The Guardian looks at "Big Food" in the US

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By chromedome
in Food Media & Arts

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chromedome

chromedome

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https://www.theguardian.com/environment/ng-interactive/2021/jul/14/food-monopoly-meals-profits-data-investigation

“Who loves a garden, loves a greenhouse too.” - William Cowper, The Task, Book Three

 

"Not knowing the scope of your own ignorance is part of the human condition...The first rule of the Dunning-Kruger club is you don’t know you’re a member of the Dunning-Kruger club.” - psychologist David Dunning

 

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gfweb

gfweb

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I'm no defender of badness, but this is just a hit piece driven by  the Environmental Working Group (who is against everything it seems) and their ilk.  One-sided biassed writing.

 

And I'm one who despises the big companies

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Anna N

Anna N

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From the linked article:

A handful of powerful companies control the majority market share of almost 80% of dozens of grocery items bought regularly by ordinary Americans, new analysis reveals.

 

I suspect one could easily remove the word Americans from the above and replace it with Canadians, Britons etc., change the brand  and company names to reveal the guilty and reach very similar conclusions. 

 

 

 

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Anna Nielsen aka "Anna N"

...I just let people know about something I made for supper that they might enjoy, too. That's all it is. (Nigel Slater)

"Cooking is about doing the best with what you have . . . and succeeding." John Thorne

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heidih

heidih

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I think we all know this. So many balls to juggle - what are our options in a complicated tangled world  Yes Nestle is evil but I have Knorr chicken powder in my pantry like much of the world.  Am I a hypocrite? Probably.

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chromedome

chromedome

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Posted
21 minutes ago, ElsieD said:

One thing I would find interesting is knowing which brands those big companies own.

There's an infographic out there. I'll take a look for it when I'm done work for the day.

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“Who loves a garden, loves a greenhouse too.” - William Cowper, The Task, Book Three

 

"Not knowing the scope of your own ignorance is part of the human condition...The first rule of the Dunning-Kruger club is you don’t know you’re a member of the Dunning-Kruger club.” - psychologist David Dunning

 

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chromedome

chromedome

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Here it is. It was researched and created by OXFAM.

 

brands.png.ab28a961771448ebaaa75142b260611d.png

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“Who loves a garden, loves a greenhouse too.” - William Cowper, The Task, Book Three

 

"Not knowing the scope of your own ignorance is part of the human condition...The first rule of the Dunning-Kruger club is you don’t know you’re a member of the Dunning-Kruger club.” - psychologist David Dunning

 

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Alex

Alex

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3 hours ago, gfweb said:

I'm no defender of badness, but this is just a hit piece driven by  the Environmental Working Group (who is against everything it seems) and their ilk.  One-sided biassed writing.

 

And I'm one who despises the big companies

 

"Hit piece" implies some nefarious purpose to the article. I don't see that. And saying that the EWG is "against everything" is hyperbole. Last I checked, they were "against" products and situations that were harmful to consumers. And in any event, the piece was produced by the Guardian in conjunction with Food and Water Watch; EWG was referenced exactly once.

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"There is no sincerer love than the love of food."  -George Bernard Shaw, Man and Superman, Act 1

 

"Imagine all the food you have eaten in your life and consider that you are simply some of that food, rearranged."  -Max Tegmark, physicist

 

Gene Weingarten, writing in the Washington Post about online news stories and the accompanying readers' comments: "I basically like 'comments,' though they can seem a little jarring: spit-flecked rants that are appended to a product that at least tries for a measure of objectivity and dignity. It's as though when you order a sirloin steak, it comes with a side of maggots."

 

"...in the mid-’90s when the internet was coming...there was a tendency to assume that when all the world’s knowledge comes online, everyone will flock to it. It turns out that if you give everyone access to the Library of Congress, what they do is watch videos on TikTok."  -Neil Stephenson, author, in The Atlantic

 

"In questions of science, the authority of a thousand is not worth the humble reasoning of a single individual." -Galileo Galilei, physicist and astronomer

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gfweb

gfweb

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3 hours ago, Alex said:

 

"Hit piece" implies some nefarious purpose to the article. I don't see that. And saying that the EWG is "against everything" is hyperbole. Last I checked, they were "against" products and situations that were harmful to consumers. And in any event, the piece was produced by the Guardian in conjunction with Food and Water Watch; EWG was referenced exactly once.

It was far from balanced journalism. Hyperbole? Not really. EWG makes pronouncements that have flimsy support at best. Never saw them say anything was OK. They feed their supporters. I know nothing about FWW, but anything that calls itself a "watch" has a point of view. 

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chromedome

chromedome

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Posted (edited)

The link on Oxfam's site will enlarge when you click it.

https://www.oxfamamerica.org/explore/stories/these-10-companies-make-a-lot-of-the-food-we-buy-heres-how-we-made-them-better/

Edited by chromedome (log)
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“Who loves a garden, loves a greenhouse too.” - William Cowper, The Task, Book Three

 

"Not knowing the scope of your own ignorance is part of the human condition...The first rule of the Dunning-Kruger club is you don’t know you’re a member of the Dunning-Kruger club.” - psychologist David Dunning

 

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