A Janus-faced food industry? : ethical reflections on corporate responsibility for health

Abstract

Chapter 1 I. Understanding the food industry's role in the rise of foodrelated health problems The rise of non-communicable disease and unhealthy diets Over the past forty years the WHO has been ringing the alarm bells to raise awareness and stimulate action to counter the rise of malnutrition and NCDs. NCDs are chronic diseases that can last a long time and are killing over 41 million people a year. While they often occur as a result of genetic, physiological, environmental and behavioural factors, they are strongly associated with an unhealthy lifestyle. In 2011 the then WHO chairman, Margaret Chan, addressed the United Nations stating that: "The worldwide increase of noncommunicable diseases is a slow-motion disaster, as most of these diseases develop over time. But unhealthy lifestyles that fuel these diseases are spreading with a stunning speed and sweep" (Chan, 2011). The notion of an unhealthy lifestyle is directly connected to our food consumption. Unhealthy diets foster high blood pressure, elevated blood lipids as well as obesity. These are metabolic risk factors for NCDs such as type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease (WHO, 2018). Our global food system plays a part in this, in a seemingly contradictory way. On the one hand the system is unable to meet the global demand, leading people to be underfed, while at the same time an increasing number of people are suffering from overweight and obesity (Stuckler et al., 2012; Stuckler & Nestle, 2012). While paradoxical at first glance, overnutrition and undernutrition are different sides of the same coin, namely that of malnutrition. People, especially those living in poverty, frequently have little choice to opt for the healthier food, as the choice might not be available, or when it is, it is too expensive. This leaves society's poor with little choice: either they do not eat, or they opt for cheap high-processed food-that is usually high on salt, sugar and fat (Development Initiatives, 2018; Ratcliffe, 2018; Stuckler & Nestle, 2012). Empirical studies also confirm that that the consumption of unhealthy food products like soft drinks, red meat and ultra-processed foods has increased over the past years (Afshin et al., 2019; Imamura et al., 2015; Micha et al., 2015). Stuckler and colleagues showed how the consumption of unhealthy commodities between 1997 II. Philosophical perspectives on responsibility and food-related health problems On business ethics and corporate responsibility Business ethics aims to articulate and explain the normative principles which can guide right action in business. Since firms and entrepreneurs are involved in many different affairs, the business ethics debate is very broad and focusses on various dimensions that relate to the conduct of business, ranging from the interactions between firms and consumers, between firms and employees, as well as between firms and society as a whole (Moriarty, 2017). General ethical theories like consequentialism, deontology or virtue ethics can be applied to explain how individuals should inter...

Food for deliberation : philosophical reflections on responsible innovation in the business context

“…The second way to answer the objection is that to the extent that there is indeed inequality in distribution of time and resources in such a way that it strongly diminishes the ability of the least well-off to engage with food, this is a problem of social justice but not so much of Borgmann's conception of the good life. In some neighbourhoods, there is indeed little access to fresh food, and there are places where fast food or highly processed food is cheaper compared to fresh fruits and vegetables (Tempels, 2019). The availability of the latter type of food is important for engaging with it as a focal thing.…”