In 2011, as a condition for joining, the World Trade Organization ordered Samoa to eliminate the ban within a year.
Eliminate a policy designed for the betterment of the population! So that's one of the aims of the WTO, to promote corporate interests, even when it's bad for the general population.
This is the whole purpose of the WTO. Last year India tried to invest on the development of solar energy and was hit by the WTO, as India cannot provide subsidies to their own companies due to the globalization rules they had to accept. Now India is trying to sue back the USA due to their own national subsidies for solar power. The expected defense of the USA: "our companies are global, yours aren't".
Why not have a subsidy that applies to companies from any country willing to do X in your country, rather than only companies headquartered in your country?
I am kind of interested how the current liberals become pro-globalization all of the sudden. They went from organizing large anti-globalization riots, and getting tear gased fighting it, to "What do you mean? We love globalization!".
I want to see a more specific analysis in how the shift happened, and maybe a more detailed timeline. Certainly an interesting topic.
Here is of course Zuckerberg with his letter worrying that people are not buying the globalization shtick very well anymore:
> liberals become pro-globalization all of the sudden. They went from organizing large anti-globalization riots
If you take everyone to the left of Reagan and put them all under one label of "liberal", then confusion understandably results. In particular, conflating Millian "liberals" with Marxist "socialists" with whoever happens to be running a street demo is a bad idea. The riots were specifically the work of the "black bloc", a small group of left-anarchists.
The general complaints of the (non-violent) protestors were to do with exactly this kind of thing - the use of a transnational process to override local environmental / labour law improvements for the profit of multinational companies.
The liberal (not socialist!) argument for free movement of people is partly the libertarian "why are you using force against a natural freedom" argument, and partly a pragmatic one that if capital now has free movement labour should as well.
A situation where capital can freely move to the most favourable jurisdiction but labour cannot is politically unsustainable.
(Yes, I left all this out of the original one-sentence snark.)
> The riots were specifically the work of the "black bloc", a small group of left-anarchists.
The riots was hyperbole, there were not the only ones advocating for anti-globalization. So was Bernie Sanders, Chomsky and many others. There were not tear gassed for it regularly but the ideology was there.
> A situation where capital can freely move to the most favourable jurisdiction but labour cannot is politically unsustainable.
The point was it was traditionally the Koch brothers and the like who advocated "globalization" not anyone calling themselves "the left". So it seems there was a reversal on the topic which I think is interesting.
You mention libertarianism, but that was usually closer aligned to conservatism than "leftism" so to speak.
> In particular, conflating Millian "liberals" with Marxist "socialists" with whoever happens to be running a street demo is a bad idea.
Yes that is the issue. I think both are referred to as "the left". And at some point it is worth pointing out the difference and seeing that from a traditional point there isn't much left left in "the left" (pun intended), which I think is interesting and was trying to find a more detailed analysis of it.
It seems to me there was split around the late 90s where the divisions are more like between "faux-liberalism + corporatism" (this includes Democrats like the Clintons and Obama), "faux-conservatism + corporatism" (Bushes), "conservatist populism" (Trump and company), "traditional left" (Sanders, Chomsky).
The "faux" bit is because the liberalism vs conservatism is a veneer used to attract whatever is deemed popular at the time. Latest Clinton campaign and Obama used identity politics and immigration to sell corporatism. Bush (junior mostly) used religion to sell "conservatism".
Also it is rather interesting that Trump capitalized on a traditional leftist position of anti-globalization (anti-NAFTA, pulling out of TPP, talk about workers etc). He probably saw a void there with Democrats abandoning that ideology and moved in opportunistically to capitalize on it.
> I am kind of interested how the current liberals become pro-globalization all of the sudden. They went from organizing large anti-globalization riots, and getting tear gased fighting it, to "What do you mean? We love globalization!".
There are a lot of groups under the "liberal" tent, like there are a lot of groups under the "conservative" tent.
I suggest you read 'The Technological Society' by Jacques Ellul. It's not an easy read, the sort of book where you take lots of notes and then learn from the notes:
Recent generations have been conditioned by society to accept globalisation - amongst other things. The book, which I only recently read myself, describes what has been happening for hundreds of years and it's to do with progress - technical progress, of which technology is just the pinnacle.
Those people who were against globalisation on the left were the old guard, the people who were strong supporters of trade unions and were proud of their local communities. Sanders is an example in the US, Corbyn or Skinner are examples in the UK.
Another source that you might find interesting is Mark Blyth - a lecturer from Brown Uni.
He looks at these topics from a long term economic viewpoint. He has a left wing academic perspective, which clouds his conclusions though. There are lots of lectures from him on YouTube.
Last time I've tried to argue for the French ban of unlimited soda refills, I was called a "Stalinist" so I probably won't say much on this one. I hope it will help to reduce their obesity rates.
The free refills policy strikes me as very American as well. The other day I paid $3.50 for a 250ml coke at a restaurant when the main course cost $4 :(
He wasn't exaggerating he was being sarcastic. He was in fact poking fun at the notion that defending a soda ban was compared to stalinism. Your outrage is misplaced.
The "Stalinism" isn't so much about the actual soda, but more about the attitude that the government should have the power to just step in and ban whatever the hell someone has decided is a bad idea this week. Once you move from the presumption of freedom to the presumption that anything that might have negative consequences should be banned, it's hard to get back.
Personally I believe that whatever consenting adults get up to is none of the government's business, whether it's weird butt stuff or selling each other unlimited quantities of sugary water. If you're going to ban one, why not ban the other? They're both enjoyable to certain people and both have negative public health consequences.
"This is what I gathered. That in that country if a man falls into ill health, or catches any disorder, or fails bodily in any way before he is seventy years old, he is tried before a jury of his countrymen, and if convicted is held up to public scorn and sentenced more or less severely as the case may be. There are subdivisions of illnesses into crimes and misdemeanours as with offences amongst ourselves—a man being punished very heavily for serious illness, while failure of eyes or hearing in one over sixty-five, who has had good health hitherto, is dealt with by fine only, or imprisonment in default of payment. But if a man forges a cheque, or sets his house on fire, or robs with violence from the person, or does any other such things as are criminal in our own country, he is either taken to a hospital and most carefully tended at the public expense, or if he is in good circumstances, he lets it be known to all his friends that he is suffering from a severe fit of immorality, just as we do when we are ill, and they come and visit him with great solicitude, and inquire with interest how it all came about, what symptoms first showed themselves, and so forth,—questions which he will answer with perfect unreserve; for bad conduct, though considered no less deplorable than illness with ourselves, and as unquestionably indicating something seriously wrong with the individual who misbehaves, is nevertheless held to be the result of either pre-natal or post-natal misfortune."
The [WTO] said in a statement that it would allow a 300 percent import duty on turkey tail imports and a domestic prohibition on sales during the transition period to allow the country to “develop and implement a nationwide program promoting healthier diet and lifestyle choices.”
Reminds me of the planet Norstrilia in Cordwainer Smith's fiction, which exports an astronomically precious immortality drug, yet maintains its archaic culture (resembling Australian ranchers with a British cultural inheritance) with import taxes of over 20000000%.
> Eliminate a policy designed for the betterment of the population!
Depends who you ask. Some people understand the risks of junk food but still want it (same as with alcohol and tobacco). Junk food also tends to be cheaper per calorie.
As an individualist, I believe competent adults should be allowed to draw their own line. But if I had to compromise, hard drugs does seem like a more reasonable line.
I've always thought there is no need for drugs to be illegal, because if they are really bad then nature provides it own penalty and if they arent bad then they shouldnt be banned anyway
And the same can't be said of drugs? Many people take psychoactive substances responsibly, and only a small percent develop problems with dependency and abuse.
Hell, I'd be willing to bet that more people who eat junk food become effective "junk food addicts" and develop resultant health problesm as a percentage than do people who use LSD, MDMA, or even cocaine.
Bananas have ~100 calories each and act as a Diuretic makeing eating large numbers of them on a regular basis unpleasant. So, I am going to call BS.
You can gain weight on a high fruit diet, but bananas are an unusual choice. Fruit juice on the other hand is much easier way to gain weight, but like most processed foods less heathy.
Dried fruit is very high in calories, for example.
And it's not like you're only eating fruit. These people would eat a normal meal and then snack on fruits constantly. So if they didn't eat fruit they'd only be getting 2000 calories a day, but it's quite easy to eat 500 calories of dried dates or dried figs.
At that point you can just as easily blame the excessive meals vs snaking as the problem. Two glasses of milk per day * 40 years can be the difference between normal weight an obisity, but it's rare for people to blame milk.
did Samoa apply bans to unhealthy locally produced food too or just to unhealthy imported food?
In general, countries like that don't have unhealthy, locally-produced food. And the article agrees with that assertion. We have a patent on junk food.
> In general, countries like that don't have unhealthy, locally-produced food. And the article agrees with that assertion.
Patently false assertion. I'm ethnically a pacific islander who grew up on a small island in Micronesia and I can assure you that local island dishes are quite unhealthy.
Samoan traditional food isn't unhealthy. Fish and taro isn't going to make anyone fat in a hurry. About 15 years ago we would joke that Samoans only got fat when they came to New Zealand and discovered KFC.
> Fish and taro isn't going to make anyone fat in a hurry.
It's easy to attribute dishes as healthy when just considering fish and taro, but this fails to acknowledge its traditional preparation with high amounts of coconut milk, salt, and sugar. Seriously, when was the last time you saw a nutritional facts label for any traditional dish? I can only speak anecdotally in that traditional Samoan dishes are not unlike Micronesia to the degree that Georgia Southern foods are clearly distinct from Alabama's flavor (that is to say they're not).
I think one of the biggest problems is the dependence of poorer remote islands in the Pacific on less perishable foods: think canned goods like Spanish sausage, Spam, sardines, Palm corned beef (from NZ), etc. or cheap frozen meats by the box, e.g. ribs, chicken, turkey legs, etc.
When I was growing up, my father would make the ocassional business trip to the FSM (specifically Palau). He'd bring boxes of frozen ribs and chicken with him and exchange for coolers of fresh lobster with his local contacts. Throw in a few cases of canned Budweiser and those business negotiations always turned out great. This might sound crazy to people who grew up in 1st-world countries, but it's a thing, and if you grew up on the islands as I did, then you know precisely what's up.
Just a couple of quotes from the article that my assertion is based on fact.
Experts say the region’s health crisis is primarily driven by a decades-long shift from traditional diets based on root crops toward ones that are high in sugar, refined starch and processed foods.
It is so wrong what is being done to exploit these nations by providing a food supply that is not, in the long term, better for health,...
To be sure, I specifically refute your claim that countries like that don't have unhealthy, locally-produced food.
As I've pointed out in a previous comment, when was the last time you saw a label of nutritional facts on any local dish anywhere in the Pacfic that allowed vetting of such a claim? When traditional preparation methods of natural foods are simply dismissed without consideration, it's easy to attribute these foods as anything but unhealthy. That's the misjudgement I see having personally grown up on a wee little-known island in the Pacific.
The quotes in the article point out the seriousness of the issue primarily driven by foreign food products high in sugar, refined starch and processed foods. I'm definitely in agreement with this claim, but it does not--indeed cannot--assert as fact that locally-produced foods are intrinsically healthy, and by that I specifically mean how they're traditional prepared.
Which begs the question: Was rigorous Western medicine on the scene prior to foreign influence that it was able to ascertain the health baseline of an indigenous population prior to its exploitation? If foreign dietary choices disappeared overnight, that doesn't necessarily mean that overall population health will realize some normalcy comparable to the rest of the 1st world. I believe there are deeply rooted cultural norms distinct to each island that have yet to be addressed.
WTO gets a lot of flack for that, but they exist to provide international trade and that requires removing local obstacles, and each obstacle will have some good reason behind it.
Countries are free to join the WTO, if they don't feel the package is worth it, they are free to opt out. What they can't do is get it piece-meal.
> WTO gets a lot of flack for that, but they exist to provide international trade and that requires removing local obstacles, and each obstacle will have some good reason behind it.
In this case a good reason, but I can just as equally imagine that (eg) some subsidy or tariff is there primarily to protect a powerful voting bloc, or friends of whichever government put the rule in place.
It's funny because the people most likely to trust the government with the power to ban junk food are the ones least likely to trust the government to can mind-altering drugs.
Fire exists, wheelchair ramps, smoke alarms, fire rated building materials.
Emission targets, waste control.
Air traffic, RF spectrum, earth orbit satellites.
Minimum wages, social security, health care, school.
Defence, police, emergence services.
We are not savages. In fact, it could be argued that the system we have is a result of having anarchy in our distant past. We rather like being governed and having institutions and civil society.
“Can anyone seriously say that Vanuatu doesn’t have the right to exercise its health sovereignty in every way possible to protect its population from an epidemic of that scale?”
I would usually say exactly that. It's up to individuals to make decisions about what they do and do not eat and live with the consequences. Foods that accurately state their nutritional content and contain only ingredients that can be safely eaten in moderation should not be banned under ordinary circumstances because overconsumption is unhealthy. The rate of increase in obesity-related disease, however is astounding and arguably justifies extraordinary measures.
I think it has to be filed under, "The constitution is not a suicide pact." No social construct, no system of laws and rights trumps the need to be alive to enjoy them. Given the scale of the problem, they were looking at a situation with an outcome grimmer than most wars. I agree with you, this is extraordinary and requires consummate measures.
I lend a lot of weight to the libertarian non-aggression principle, but I think it's generally a mistake to think about social issues in absolute terms. I really don't like coercion, but the NAP, also shouldn't be a suicide pact.
If you're willing to set the NAP aside for junk food, your bar for setting aside the NAP is likely pretty low. But my own perspective is that of a person who scrutinizes what I put in my body. I've never felt that I needed someone else to make that decision for me.
If someone released smallpox in NYC, it would be reasonable to quarantine the state (at the very least). There would be no argument about the government taking action to prevent the spread of virtually any pathogen, even the more pedestrian like multiple drug resistant TB.
People loose sight of reality when they think pure choice is involved though. Food, smoking, drugs... a lot of things only make sense if you're particularly educated, have friends/family struggling with something, are particularly empathetic, or have experienced them.
It's up to individuals to make decisions about what they do and do not eat and live with the consequences.
True, but when that level of individual freedom has negative repercussions on the community, the government has to step in. Else the society will cease to be.
Imagine if our (USA) govt allowed us to buy gas (fuel, petrol) with lead in it, ignoring the long term impact of lead in the environment.
Individual freedom is not absolute. An one should not be allowed to engage in habits that harms the community in that fashion. Yes, there are things we can't avoid, but when necessary, the govt has the powers to regulate individual habits.
Unfortunately for these countries, membership in the WTO does not serve their interests in this regard.
There's a significant distinction between polluting the environment, which harms other people directly and making unhealthy decisions in one's own life, which has only indirect effects on others.
In countries that provide publicly-funded healthcare you are arguably directly effecting other people's lives by the cost of the medical treatments you'll end up needing if you are obese - these treatments will be funded out of the taxpayer's pocket, when that money could be going to better schooling, infrastructure, or some other use.
Likewise, if an individual makes a choice that causes his or her taxable income to decrease, he or she has arguably (by the same argument) directly effected other people's lives by reducing the tax revenue of the country.
Ought governments impose some incentive for individuals to earn as much taxable income as possible?
So was the parent comment. They could just help themselves to whatever they needed if the law didn't stop them. Poverty is legally enforced on people that don't earn enough.
We could certainly have arguments about the allocation of natural resources and the merits of propertarian vs. antipropertarian societies, and I've done and enjoyed a lot of that, but it's out of the scope of this particular argument. In this context, the fact that government will punish a person for taking what is considered the property of another person is not in the same class as a fine or imprisonment for choosing to reduce one's taxable income.
This is also true with privately-funded health care based on insurance with shared risk pools that don't take behavioral risk factors in to account. It's the very definition of a moral hazard.
But if you accept that argument, where is the line? What personal decisions, if any shouldn't be subject to regulation?
True, but I was arguing that poor personal health choices are not only an indirect negative effect on other people, which is what you said. And I neglected obvious direct negative effects it can have on people close to you, such as children who now have to care for a parent who loses their leg due to diabetes, or who don't get to experience play because of a parent who's so obese and unfit that they can barely walk around without wheezing.
Edit: I can't give you a list of personal decisions that I think should be subject to regulation, because it's not as simple as that, and there's a debate to be had for each one, and that will depend on circumstances and ideology. But I do think that in this case it's reasonable, since the cost of treating diabetes patients is crippling a small, poor country.
That seems like the logical conclusion. Where's the dividing line between what the government should and shouldn't regulate, if they judge it to be in the best interests of the people (and the government's will being theoretically derived from the collective will of the governed)?
The government's will being theoretically derived from the collective will of the governed should not be used as a blanket appeal to authority. The people probably do not like all of their private communication being spied on by the NSA. That we've not yet elected officials and given them the power to stop such spying doesn't mean it's acceptable.
Moving on, the people should by default be free to make decisions that are not in their best interests. Just because you can't control yourself from eating candy doesn't mean my Right to Candy should be taken away as well.
Taking away liberty must be very, very carefully considered. What is the harm being prevented? What price is being paid to remove it? Seatbelts are a low cost to implement, a low cost to wear, and offer a high return of value in lives and health saved.
Banning imported food at tourist established is a much less obvious win. If I can't indulge in a sugary treat on vacation then when can I? That sounds like something the local agriculture industry is lobbying for more than anything. Who benefits the most from this change? Follow the money and I bet (heh) you'll find the big winners aren't the obese population.
> Taking away liberty must be very, very carefully considered
I agree, and it's possible that this move has been very carefully considered. The obesity levels are catastrophic, and the trend has been clear for years (maybe decades), so it's quite possible that this move has been considered for some time before finally being implemented. There's no reason not to give the benefit of the doubt here.
I'd also add that any move to take away liberty needs to be reviewed at some point. Otherwise the tendency is for more and more regulation. Then typically the only way things get changed is by major lobbying efforts, which can takes years or decades, or when a negative effect on society has become such a problem that it's no longer possible to ignore it. In the meantime, a lot of people have had their lives impacted.
> Banning imported food at tourist established is a much less obvious win
Yeah, though maybe that part is related to the "effort to promote local agriculture" that's also mentioned in the article. It still seems like something that would have little actual impact - it's hard to believe that tourists are coming and only eating junk food, and not any food that's locally grown. No-one goes on holiday and eats only Pringles.
Or maybe it's about perceived fairness - staff at tourist resorts have access to foods that the rest of the population can't buy, so they remove that access to put everyone on the same level.
A fat slob overflowing the seat next to me on an aeroplane has a direct effect on me and I would be perfectly happy for measures to be taken to mitigate it.
Or we could get rid of anti-discrimination laws and allow airlines to charge based on weight/have assigned seating types. But I imagine that wouldn't go over very well with the people who want to ban junk food.
Most airlines in the US have an official policy allowing them to require passengers who cannot sit in a single seat with the armrests lowered and seatbelt fastened to pay for an additional seat. They usually try to employ alternatives, but on full flights, people do get bumped if they don't fit in one seat.
Those are arbitrary "principles" that only make sense in the context of a given arbitrary political ideology.
I want to live in a country where it's easy to be lean, so that as many people as possible are lean, because there are no downsides to being lean, and infinite upsides.
Paying in relation to what you use seems fair. Sending small packages costs less than big heavy packages. What's a few bucks' difference anyway?
Unfortunately, it has been pursued as though it is, which is a natural progression of the 'slippery slope' argument. For example, there was the relatively high profile Hooters weight discrimination lawsuit which was allowed to proceed and settled for an undisclosed amount, even though there was no legal basis of wrongdoing.
There's the scale of economics. If only few people buy healthy food, supermarkets have no incentive to offer it at all. Even if they offer healthy food, the price is higher because they can't buy in bulk or else they waste much of it.
> If only few people buy healthy food, supermarkets have no incentive to offer it at all.
Then how come most grocery stores have healthy food?
If it truly was a minority group that wanted to eat healthy food, what right do they have to force the majority to buy what they want to make it more economical? Although the premise is flawed, because the real reason 'healthy food' is expensive is because the foods considered healthy inherently cannot use many methods that increase yield like pesticides. And then some go so far as to claim GMO's are unhealthy/cannot be organic, further driving up the prices of foods that get to wear the healthy food labels. Increasing demand for healthy food would make it more expensive, certainly in the short term.
> Then how come most grocery stores have healthy food?
All over America there are many areas known as "food deserts" because stores do not stock fresh foods and produce. In those areas the only food readily available is shelf-stable, highly processed, very high caloric density junk food.
Now think about being on a Pacific island where leaving your food desert is not just a matter of a long drive or bus ride down the road to a different community.
Wow I just had a thought. Imagine if the WTO had been around when countries started banning the sale of Tetraethyllead.
The TEL industry fought very hard against such action first by attacking the science, then fighting in courts and political arenas. Imagine if they had access to a super-national court explicitly created as a way for large corporations to punish governments for creating laws that are bad for their business?
> True, but when that level of individual freedom has negative repercussions on the community, the government has to step in
Good, then I guess the government should tell everyone to exercise too? I mean, people not exercising has negative repercussions on the community, so the government has to step in. Mandatory exercise for everyone.
I guess the same logic applies to limiting gaming/Internet time too.
Mandatory exercise is certainly consistent with banning unhealthy food, but I wonder why (presumably) very few people who advocate the latter would advocate the former. My guess is that the enforcement mechanisms feel different on the surface, because forced exercise requires physical force (or fines, etc.) on each individual, while banning junk food requires force on manufacturers and/or retailers (I'm not sure the distinction is very clear, since these entities are comprised of individuals). Yet that doesn't feel like a sufficient explanation, since many people advocate the prohibition of certain drugs, which does require the use of force against individuals.
> Imagine if our (USA) govt allowed us to buy gas (fuel, petrol) with lead in it, ignoring the long term impact of lead in the environment.
Lead has a quantifiable effect that directly infringes on the rights of others -- eating junk food does not. You cannot say that my choice to get fat infringes on anyone's freedoms more than you are infringing on my freedom by preventing me from eating what I choose. It's not a characteristic of a free society. Pure democracy is mob rule. We might as well ban gay marriage, too, because there are more people who don't like it and claim it infringes on their rights than there are people who want to get gay marriages (see how that can be twisted the other way?)
Under Obamacare, their increased health care costs also costs everyone (in part because Obamacare is the worst of all worlds -- it would be difficult to intentionally design something worse).
As someone who was uninsurable before Obamacare, no, it is not the worst of all worlds.
The worst of all worlds is when an otherwise-healthy 37 year old can't buy insurance because he had his gallbladder out in his early 20s. Which is what we had before obamacare.
I worked in insurance for over five years. "Universal insurance" is the worst possible way to try to make sure all citizens have access to medical care. There are other proven systems that are vastly better.
As I understand it: Good ideas come from individuals. Good sorting of ideas comes from a crowd. Trying to get a crowd to make good ideas is apparently not very functional.
If it's up to individuals, can they not also choose to outsource that job to a governmental agency to establish sensible defaults on their behalf? Note I'm not proposing to prevent anyone who really wants to purchase shitty food from purchasing it, but I do think the costs should reflect the externalities.
But I do wonder what the bloody hell is going on in Vanuatu! Maybe Polynesian populations have metabolic adaptations that don't work with high-sugar diets? It does seem so:[0]
> Pacific people (especially Micronesian and Polynesian) have some of the highest rates of obesity and diabetes in the world that largely developed since the introduction of western culture and diet. Recent studies suggest that much of the risk relates to the excessive intake of sugar (sucrose) and carbohydrates, leading to a type of fat storage syndrome (metabolic syndrome). Here we discuss some of the environmental, genetic and epigenetic reasons why this group might be especially prone to developing obesity and diabetes compared to other ethnic groups. Indirect evidence suggests that the higher endogenous uric acid levels in the Polynesian-Micronesian population may represent a predisposing factor for the development of obesity and diabetes in the context of Western diets and lifestyles. Pacific people may be an ideal group to study the role of “thrifty genes” in the pathogenesis of the current obesity epidemic.
That's arguably a good enough reason to ban junk food imports.
The headline seems a bit sensational given that the actual ban applies to government and tourist establishments. Seems reasonable that any government should be able to setup standards that have only the jurisdiction to apply to their own entities and/or functions. This doesn't prevent individuals from consuming things as they see fit.
"
planning to outlaw all imported food at government functions and tourist establishments across the province’s 13 inhabited islands.
"
Additionally most of these imported items inherently cost more than local foods in a lot of places anyways so it's not completely out of the norm.
You're conflating two different things: 1) whether a sovereign nation has health under its own jurisdiction, and 2) whether a sovereign nation should ban food, given it has the power.
I think there's a third issue, or at least two pieces to your number 2.
Whether a government should have the mechanism of banning foods that are safe to eat in moderation available to it is a different question than whether it would be good policy given that mechanism.
If the government should be in the habit of regulating nutrition, banning foods with exceptionally poor nutritional qualities is probably good policy, but is that the kind of thing governments should be regulating at all? I would argue that it usually isn't and should only be permitted in exceptional circumstances.
In the same way that vehicles can move thousands of times faster than humans, and metal can be thousands of times stronger than human flesh, is there any good reason to think that marketing manipulation, or market forces, can't be (or become) thousands of times stronger than human willpower?
On the one hand, everybody would end up healthier, smarter, more productive, more attractive, richer (less healthcare spending), more psychologically healthy (the gut is the 2nd brain, bad diet means bad emotional health), will live longer, have their friends and family live longer.
On the other hand, people will be unable to satisfy their sugar addiction (sugar is completely unnecessary from a nutritional point of view, and harmful even at low doses).
Nothing comes "free". If there is an alcoholic in the family, that lowers the whole family's nurturance level, degrades the marriage, increases the probability of divorce, and undeniably hurts the kids. Sugar addiction is no different from alcohol addiction. The addict isn't the only one who suffers. Similarly, if your social circle is fat, you're more likely to be, and stay, fat. Getting rid of junk food has no downsides, unlike getting rid of alcohol. Junk food is harmful even in low doses, whereas alcohol isn't in moderation.
1) Banning certain restaurants would have a positive net effect on society.
2) Any government with the authority to ban restaurants would choose which restaurants to ban incorrectly, due to honest mistakes, influence from lobbying, or other reasons, and the end net effect on society would be negative.
All rules should be quantitative. Not qualitative.
Qualitative: We are banning "junk food". (What constitutes junk food?)
Quantitative: We are banning any foods where the sugar content exceeds 1% (Where this number can become increasingly stricter) of the food's mass. eg. Coke is 9% sugar[0]; 39 / (355 + 39 + 39 + .045) = 0.09.
Of course, that's a somewhat better idea, but I was specifically responding to a claim that banning McDonald's would have a positive effect on society.
Your idea is inevitably going to have problems as well. What about selling table sugar itself? What about fruit, which can also be around 10% sugar? What about desserts and confectionery? Are we really wanting the government to ban those completely?
I don't get it. Would you rather the government have the authority to ban restaurants, or not? "The government only banning the restaurants that ought to be banned" isn't an option, unless you have good ideas on how to structure government.
The opinion we're discussing is whether governments ought to be able to ban restaurants, so what governments do is absolutely relevant.
I'm saying the government should ban it. You're arguing the government should, but shouldn't be able to. That only makes sense if you adhere to a set of arbitrary political "principles", which I view as nonsense. Government needs to solve problems, not obey imaginary rules.
It doesn't help that there are little healthy options in local schools. Most schools have a single privatised canteen that offers a lunch option (typically chicken curry and rice or chicken chow mein) with the rest being soda drinks, chocolate bars or salty chips. I don't remember apples or bananas being an option unless you brought it from home. But you don't want to be the kid eating a banana when everyone around you is guzzling RC Cola (the supposedly healthier alternative to Coca Cola).
Pacific Islanders like to eat. I think it's ingrained in their culture. Before you call me out and ask for a citation, let me just say this is based on my experience as a Fiji Islander. But maybe there's no problem with eating a lot, if what you eat is healthy. So instead of reaching for the local produce, the cheaper and more attractive "Western" product wins out. Plus, it's just a tad more cheaper.
P.S. It's very easy to buy Singles or Loosies (sp?) in Fiji.
As someone who went to NYC public school where all food options are extremely unhealthy, I can say that this has mostly to do with culture.
Eastern European immigrants stayed thin. Chinese immigrants stayed thin. Immigrants from some other countries - mostly south america in my personal experience - all gained weight quickly.
Stan Efferding, a prominent bodybuilder, powerlifter, and YouTube fitness celebrity does a great talk on how first changed on the islands after they started picking up on American food trends:
Why are they considering banning junk food from tourist establishments when it is really the locals with obesity issues? Or is the junk food primary sold in tourist establishments and the locals go there?
Why don't they raise taxes instead? At least if it doesn't work they'd make a hell lot of money. I mean, it seems efficient for tobacco in my country (France). I don't know why it couldn't work for junk food.
In a lot of countries, it is easier to enforce a public ban than it is to collect taxes.
A high tax on imports may simply lead to imports being smuggled in, and tax stamps being forged. A total ban can be trivially enforced---see a junk food container, its illegal.
The obesity situation on Pacific islands is a complex interaction of genetics, economics, and geography/geopolitics: a small genetic predisposition to larger frames and more efficient fat storage (described in multiple papers, like this one [1]), poor and underdeveloped economies increasingly unable to compete in a globalized world, and a shift [2] to energy-dense diets driven by affordability, convenience, and long shelf-life necessary to survive a long import journey and inexpensive storage for year-round availability.
This, coupled with a "modern" lifestyle of less and less manual labor results in an overabundance of unspent caloric intake. As the article in [2] says, which specifically talks about Micronesia but is applicable elsewhere in the Pacific:
"Micronesians are essentially selling their own natural food resources for a fraction of the true value, and then using the revenue to import nutrient-poor food (...) The FSM does not have the infrastructure to realistically compete in the global tuna market. Thus, the current structure of the Pacific tuna industry is an example of how lack of development (partly due to the U.S subsidies and U.S. dependence) has lead the FSM to continue to be dependent on foreign nations. The cash-economy stemming from the tuna industry contributes to the continued cycle of food dependence, imported-food, and poor diet, which is partly responsible for Micronesia's unhealthy, obese population."
Edit: As with regard to Vanuatu specifically, you can read a report on their food, agriculture, and fishery situation here [3], authored by FAO of the UN. To paraphrase, widespread industrial fishing by foreign nations was prevalent decades ago, but has since shifted to other Pacific states. Subsistence fishing occurs, but the cash-based economy (i.e. where you buy your food, rather than catch it) is much larger, and the presence of tourism sites has priced most locals out of domestically-caught fish, while leaving imported chicken and domestic beef affordable, as well as imported canned fish. This report doesn't mention foods typically considered junk food, but calorie-dense imports of shelf-stable food are documented elsewhere.
From my experience with Polynesians (and since I live in New Zealand, I've met my fair share), it's a cultural issue more than anything else. It may have started for those reasons, but it's being perpetuated by culture.
I know of Samoan families that have spent thousands of dollars on corned beef (the stuff in a tin) for weddings.
Just the last night I was having dinner with a Samoan bloke, he ate 5 packs of instant noodles, 3 croissants, and half a chicken for dinner. I've seen him also eat 2 tins of spaghetti, 2 tins of corned beef, and half a loaf of white bread for dinner. He's in New Zealand, there's no shortage of fresh food and vegetables, and there's no reason for eating that much food (as everybody else near him points out).
Now I'm not sure what made it a cultural thing to eat obscene amounts of food, but it's deeply ingrained, the majority of Polynesians in New Zealand are obese, they have a whole slew of health problems because of it.
There's an alternative opinion (espoused by some in medical research community and author Gary Taubes) describing the situation as simple and straigtforward - islanders developed obesity (and diabetes, and gout, and heart disease) after gaining access to sugar in various forms, including soft drinks. Remove sugar and its substitutes from the equation, and high obesity rates disappear.
Blaming "modern" lifestyle rarely makes sense in global context - it's not as if in countries with low obesity rates one has to hunt and gather their food.
Take the example of Qatar, where a "modern" lifestyle is a clear and obvious contributor to the fourth-highest obesity rate in the world. A state which in just 70 years has ascended to the country with the highest per capita income, and the fourth highest GDP per capita; it has used generous oil and natural gas revenues to massively raise the country's Human Development Index and institute a welfare state. Despite internationally-highlighted issues with among others, corporal punishment, the treatment of migrant laborers, and the mortal danger for homosexuals, most average Qatari live very, very well.
Yet in this short span of time, traditions haven't adjusted for the altered diet, air-conditioned comfort, and sudden lack of need to perform manual labor (which is now done by foreign migrant workers instead). So far in Qatar, government spending on healthcare has not been able to stem the rise in obesity, so other social health promotion programmes are being deployed.
Singapore, Korea, Japan and Thailand are as comfortable and air-conditioned as any, have access to similar motorcycles, cars, television sets and computers as others, and yet enjoy some of the lowest obesity rates in the world.
There are developed countries (with relaxed lifestyles) at the top of the obesity ratings, there are developed countries (with relaxed lifestyles) at the bottom of the obesity ratings, lifestyle change does not seem to correlate very heavily.
I don't know which is worse, moral busy-bodying in the name of religion, or moral busy-bodying in the name of health, or public transport, or many of the pet causes here.
Probably because Mike Ives is submitting the report from Hong Kong. I guess he could have flown in and done the reporting on-site, but probably was able to get all the information via other means and it didn't require him to go on-site.
Eliminate a policy designed for the betterment of the population! So that's one of the aims of the WTO, to promote corporate interests, even when it's bad for the general population.