Nutrition Group Has Close Ties to Food, Pharma Companies

A large U.S. nutrition group and its foundation have a "symbiotic" relationship with the food and pharmaceutical industries, according to public health researchers.

In an analysis of documents obtained via a freedom of information request, key leadership for the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics (AND) hold important positions in multinational food and agribusiness companies, according to Angela Carriedo, PhD, of the World Public Health Nutrition Association, and colleagues.

The AND has also invested funds in corporations such as Nestle, PepsiCo, and pharmaceutical companies, and has accepted substantial corporate financial contributions, Carriedo and colleagues reported in the journal Public Health Nutrition.

"The fact that the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics was a part owner of ultra-processed food companies should go down in the conflict of interest Hall of Fame," Gary Ruskin, executive director of the watchdog organization U.S. Right to Know, and a co-author on the paper, told MedPage Today.

"The big picture here is that obesity and type two diabetes, of course, are diseases that individual people suffer, but they're also diseases of corporate influence," Ruskin said. "The ultra-processed food industry uses its influence to hook people on its products and it is able to corrupt health groups like the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics to legitimize and perpetuate its hold on our nation's stomachs, and that's why this is important."

Ruskin noted that the academy and its foundation have enormous influence as they represent more than 112,000 credentialed practitioners, including registered dietitian nutritionists.

In a statement, the AND responded to what it described as "misleading and false allegations" in the report, calling it a "calculated attack" against nutrition and dietetics professionals. "The report contains numerous factual and methodology errors, omissions, and information taken out of context," the statement said.

"Academy members are advocates for shaping policies and practices to advance positive food choices that improve the health and nutrition of the public," the statement continued. "Through their assumptions, omissions, and distortions, the authors of the report have done a serious disservice to the Academy, our members and the entire nutrition and dietetics profession."

For their report, Ruskin and colleagues analyzed academy documents from 2014 to 2020 that were obtained through freedom of information requests, and cross-referenced that information with publicly available data. In total, the authors said they collected more than 80,000 files that revealed evidence of the academy's key leadership dealing with several food, pharmaceutical, and agribusiness corporations.

They found the academy had accepted more than $15 million from corporations in those industries between 2011 and 2017. Several companies were found to have contributed hundreds of thousands of dollars to the academy and its foundation, including:

• National Dairy Council (gave $1,496,912)

• Conagra Inc. ($1,414,058)

• Abbott Nutrition ($1,246,389)

• PepsiCo Inc. ($486,335)

• Coca-Cola Co. ($477,577)

• Hershey Co. ($368,032)

• General Mills Inc. ($309,733)

• Kellogg USA ($273,272)

Ruskin said these contributions were part of a "quid pro quo" that included "rights and benefits" for the corporate sponsors. Ruskin and co-authors wrote that the documents revealed "several cases when [the academy] has legitimized some corporate positions."

Indeed, Ruskin and co-authors found several incidents where the academy acted to influence other organizations and the public by providing supporting evidence for those industry sponsors.

One example was a 2017 task force on genetically modified organisms (GMOs) that produced a report with critical views that would have been considered "a direct criticism of the products of some sponsors" for the academy. The authors said the documents revealed that three academy board members attempted to delay the report from being presented during a meeting, "where corporate funding opportunities were to be discussed," according to the investigation.

In another example, documents revealed the academy's leadership discussing the nature of their involvement in the U.S. agriculture secretary's new Sodium Awareness initiative in 2017, which was designed to help reduce sodium in school meals. One academy leader wrote in response to this effort, "although this is a tremendous HONOR, we do seem to be talking out of both sides of our mouth in regards to sodium."

In terms of the AND's investments, internal documents from 2015 to 2016 show the organization invested in the stock of several food and pharmaceutical companies, including Abbott, Johnson & Johnson, Pfizer, Merck, PepsiCo, Nestle, and J.M. Smucker's Company.

As for conflicts of interest among its leadership, the report cites how a director of AND, Milton Stokes, worked for Monsanto. That company contributed $175,000 to the AND Foundation, and established a communications advisory group with AND members.

The researchers said their findings "show striking similarities to other cases of institutions captured by corporations, such as the International Life Science Institute and the Global Energy Balance Network, orchestrated by the soft drink industry to promote its commercial agenda in scientific institutions."

They concluded that their study "illustrates the extent to which corporate funding enables corporate influence at AND specifically, and across such partnerships more widely. It also suggests this has been normalized, considering the nature of the agreements made and the relationships formed."

"Although AND has changed some of its internal policies to manage corporate interference and funding," they wrote, "it continues to advance corporate interests in several ways and serves as a voice for its corporate sponsors."

Comment