A July 14 Business article about the marketing of food to children misstated the name of a cartoon character. It is Dora the Explorer, not Dora the Explora.
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Debate Pops Open Over Soda Warnings
Candystand.com is an online gaming site that features candy ads in its games, a sore point with consumer activists who want more regulation.
(Candystand.com)
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The American Beverage Association said current nutrition labels provide consumers with the information they need. Besides, it noted, soft-drink consumption has declined since 1998. According to Beverage Digest, a trade publication, average per-capita consumption dropped from 576 12-ounce cans a year in 1998 to 558 cans in 2004. The main reason for the drop, said editor John Sicher, is the "phenomenal growth of bottled water."
"Requiring warning labels on food that is perfectly safe is a waste of everyone's time," said Richard Martin, a spokesman for the grocery manufacturers.
Instead, the association, whose members sell $530 billion of food and drink products annually, called for stricter voluntary rules governing ads aimed at children. In a preview of comments it plans to make at the workshop, the group said it will ask advertisers to substantially boost funding and staff for an industry group to review those ads.
Currently, the Children's Advertising Review Unit (CARU) regularly reviews such ads, based on guidelines developed by the industry. It has an annual budget of $650,000 and a staff of six -- too small, its critics say, to adequately police the billions of dollars in kids promotions.
Critics say the review unit has no enforcement tools and does not monitor new trends, such as promoting products to kids through online games.
The grocery association said CARU's guidelines should be clear that they apply to online games, computer games and video games. Similarly, the guidelines should be tightened to make sure licensed characters such as Scooby-Doo or Mickey Mouse are used appropriately to promote foods, although the group did not elaborate.
Susan Linn, a Harvard psychologist who is also a founder of the Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood, said, "These proposals may sound good, but they won't address the fundamental issue: By relying only on voluntary self-regulation we have turned our children over to an industry that generates profits by selling them junk food."
CARU director Elizabeth L. Lascoutx said her group is studying how to regulate online games. She said the manufacturers' suggestions "are for the most part things we already do, like prescreening ads. We've been doing that for the last 15 years."
