Posted on 05/22/2011 1:27:43 PM PDT by DannyTN
American sugar farmers and refiners have filed a suit to stop big corn processors from marketing high-fructose corn syrup as a “natural” product equivalent to real sugar.
The suit, filed in U.S. District Court in Los Angeles by Western Sugar Cooperative, Michigan Sugar Company and C & H Sugar Company, Inc., charges that the “corn sugar” branding campaign financed by the corn refining industry’s giant companies constitutes false advertising under federal and state law. The processors’ campaign was launched as a way to thwart declining sales of high-fructose corn syrup, or “HFCS.”
Companies named as defendants include Archer Daniels Midland Company, Cargill, Inc., Corn Products International, Inc., Penford Products Co., Roquette America, Inc., Tate & Lyle Ingredients Americas, Inc. and the companies’ marketing and lobbying organization, The Corn Refiners Association, Inc.
“This suit is about false advertising, pure and simple,” said Inder Mathur, President and CEO of Western Sugar Cooperative. “If consumers are concerned about your product, then you should improve it or explain its benefits, not try to deceive people about its name or distort scientific facts.”
The sugar producers seek an injunction to end the advertising campaign and also seek damages, including compensation for corrective advertising.
According to the complaint, consumers have increasingly sought to avoid food and drinks containing HFCS, because of its possible role in the obesity epidemic and other nutritional and health problems, or simply to avoid non-natural ingredients. As a result, food and beverage makers have been replacing HFCS with real sugar, and the corn refining industry has seen HFCS sales steadily decline.
The sugar producers charge the defendants with trying to resuscitate HFCS sales through a marketing blitz aimed at changing consumer perceptions of HFCS by equating it with real sugar. The defendants are attempting to do so, allege the sugar producers, by marketing HFCS as a natural sugar that is simply extracted from corn, which is not true.
While the corn refining industry has petitioned the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for approval to substitute “corn sugar” for “high-fructose corn syrup” on ingredient labels, the sugar-producing plaintiffs assert that the defendants did not even wait for the FDA’s response before beginning their “corn sugar” branding efforts. The complaint states that “Defendants’ resort to such literally false and misleading statements harms consumers, harms the makers of real sugar and harms any dialogue based on the truth. This lawsuit seeks to put an end to the deception.”
One reason the foods taste awful is that the fruits are picked before they’re ripe. A lot of imported fruits and fruit spreads, from Italy, Turkey, and quite a few other countries are sweet and tasty with little or no added CANE sugar. I won’t buy anything with corn syrup in it.
“Big Corn” has donated MILLIONS to Bob Dole, Chuckles Grassley, and Kit Bond all Republicrats.
You gotta start them inside during the spring or they just wash away in the april rains.
as a way to thwart declining sales...
HFCS is pure poison - not to mention one of the main causes of the great incline in obesity in this country in the past 3 decades.
Most other countries wont allow it.
Take Coca Cola, for example, You can't get it in the U.S. without HFCS - unless you're close enough to the borders of Mexico or Canada and can pick up Coca Cola bottles - AND ALSO ONLY IN GLASS BOTTLES - bottled for those countries.
Here, even with a gerzillion different kinds of Coca Cola, they don't even give us one choice with cane sugar.
Pepsi, at least, is testing the waters and offers Pepsi "Throwback" - made with "REAL" sugar, but that means it's probably beet sugar. You want CANE sugar. Beet sugar in GMO'd. Look for the companies that say CANE sugar. And they TASTE better too.
So - instead of at least offering us a CHOICE of HFCS or cane sugar - they are trying to call HFCS by another name.
PUt a chart of the rise of obesity and the increased use of HFCS together and they are identical.
Where's madam "Food Czar" on THIS issue. Instead of telling us, as individuals, what we can and can't eat, do what we can't do ourselves - go after the manufacturers who market poison in their foods.
It's not just in sodas and juices and candies and gums - it's in just about anything pre-made. And it wrecks havoc on your health, not just obesity.
Which crony industry, corn syrup or sugar, will the FDA side with?
My bet is corn syrup, since it inhibits health and, therefore, supports the drug and death industries that are the core back-scratchers of the FDA.
It’s amazing to look as a 1st grade class photo from the 1950’s compared to now. Obesity has take over.
So how is the suit classified? Alienation of confection?
Nobody gonna lay finger on the corn monopolies.
Snapple uses real sugar now too. Their peach tea is the bomb shizznit.
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