Daily Archives: June 2, 2010

FDA seeks front of package label input [FOOD BUSINESS NEWS]

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In some more magazine-reading-based news, I saw in Food Business News in their May 11 2010 issue on page 15 that the FDA “…has requested that any parties interested in the issues of front-of-package nutrition labels and retail shelf tags submit comments as well as data regarding the topics.”

Wow. The FDA wants input from everyone on what to put on the front of foodstuff packaging? That’s fairly progressive!

The Food Business News article says that… “specifically, the agency would like to learn more about the extent to which consumers notice, use and understand nutrition symbols on front-of-pack labeling of food packages or on shelf tags in retail stores; research that assesses and compares the effectiveness of particular approaches to front-of-pack labeling; graphic design, marketing and advertising data and information that can help develop better point-of-purchase nutrition information; and how point-of-purchase information may affect decisions by food manufacturers to reformulate products.”

So what would you like to see on the front of food packaging? What nutritional information would you require at a glance? How should it look graphically?

Personally, I want to see a foodstuff’s calories, fat content, carb content, number of servings per container, and whether or not it is organic in a big font in the front and left corner with no graphics from the foodstuff to obstruct the information. Everything else can stay on the nutrition label on the side.

The article goes on to say… “the F.D.A. is accepting comments until July 28, 2010. Comments may be sent to http://www.regulations.gov, by entering Docket No. FDA-2010-N-0210. Written comments also may be sent to the Division of Dockets Management (HFA-305) Food and Drug Administration, 5630 Fishers Lane, Room 1061, Rockville Md., 20852.”

Cool!

Here’s the link to the article on Food Business News (it has a annoying register-to-read requirement, but the link I posted might get around that). If that first link didn’t work, try this one. Just in case both of those do not work, below is a scan of the original magazine article.

FDA seeks front of package nutrition labeling info

FDA seeks front of package nutrition labeling info

BTW, Food Business News is one of my favorite magazines because of the info I get on the retail food industry. Their website could be better if it wasn’t a “register-to-read” site, but the articles online and in print are always top notch. I re-subscribe to these guys all the time.

See the size of the gulf oil spill superimposed on major cities (update 06/02/10)

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Not too long ago, I posted a link to a website that shows you how big the oil spill is if it were superimposed on major cities.

I was curious to see how things looked today, so I went back and put in some new locations.

This is the oil spill (as of today) if it were centered on Scranton, PA.

Oil Spill 06/02/10 - PA & NY

Oil Spill 06/02/10 - PA & NY

All of Manhattan. A good chunk of the Atlantic. Connecticut. Pennsylvania. New Jersey. A giant swath of New York State.

Imagine all of this land covered in oil.

So how about putting this monster over Texas?

Oil Spill 06/02/10 - TX

Oil Spill 06/02/10 - TX

Using Temple, TX (slightly south of Waco) as the “center”, the spill goes into Taylor/Runnels county to the West, Fort Worth and Dallas to the North, the Louisiana border to the East and Houston to the south.

As a point of reference, driving from Ballinger (a town in Scranton in the spill area) direct to Houston is over a 6 hour drive at 70-75 mph.

Damn.

According to the original oil spill size blog (alexanderhiggins.com), “60,000 barrels of oil are leaking into the Gulf of Mexico every day. That is equal to one Exxon-Valdez oil spill leaking into the Gulf of Mexico every 4 days.”

Why, exactly, is BP not getting reamed for this?

Why, exactly, isn’t the president doing a “fist of an angry God” impression on BP’s corporate entity?

Here’s the link to the original blog with the map if you want to see how the oil spill would look over your state.