Better for you brands will have an opportunity to play a pivotal role in helping to reshape the habits of consumers over the next couple of decades.  This could be a huge factor in the USA’s health as the CDC predicts that obesity will continue to rise and affect 42% of Americans by 2030.  That’s up from 34%.  Currently, it’s estimated that 35.7% of American adults — 78 million people — and 16.9% of U.S. children and adolescents — 12.5 million kids — are obese.  This means they have a BMI of over 30.  According to Duke University global health professor Eric A. Finkelstein, co-author of the report on obesity, “The Weight of the Nation,”  The new projections capture several trends in American society: the swelling population of Latino adults, among whom obesity is a growing problem, the transition into adulthood of a population of obese children — especially African American boys — who stand a high likelihood of becoming obese adults, and the aging of overweight and obese adults.

Better4you brands should consider getting involved with running to drive home health messages.  Why?  Running increases the average life expectancy of men and women by around six years, a study found. The greatest benefit came from jogging at a “slow or average” pace – enough to cause slight breathlessness – rather than pushing to physical limits.  Danish heart expert Dr. Peter Schnohr, who led the study as part of the Copenhagen City Heart Study project, said: “The results of our research allow us to definitively answer the question of whether jogging is good for your health. We can say with certainty that regular jogging increases longevity.”   The findings show that compared with non-joggers the risk of death for both male and female runners was reduced by 44%. The data showed that, after taking account of age, jogging increased the lifespan of men by 6.2 years and of women by 5.6 years.

Men are becoming a more important target for marketers when it comes to supermarket shopping.  Shopping scientist and author Herb Sorenson says we’re seeing a societal evolution at the grocery store. “The erosion of the traditional family is why you have more men doing the shopping.”  An ESPN study shows 31-percent of grocery shoppers are men. In 1985 only 14 percent handled the shopping duties. Mintel research claims that nearly 24% of married men say they are the primary buyer of personal care items; and 1/3 of married men say they are the primary buyer of food and drinks.   Some key retailers get it:  Walmart and Target are phasing in “man aisles.”

Chef Jamie Oliver is continuing to take a leadership role in making a better for you world.  He is behind a new movement in the U.K., called Food Revolution Day on May 19, to encourage people worldwide to think about where our food comes from.   He says, “I’m working really hard to promote this event as a forum for everyone around the world to express their support and stand up for real food.  Why? Because obesity and diet-related diseases cost the National Health Service around £6billion a year and cause one in every ten deaths in the UK.  There’s no master plan to give our children the tools to live longer, healthier, happier and more productive lives. If you’re not happy with the status quo and the path your kids are going down, now is the time to take action.”

Starting a family does not lead young adults to a better4you diet, finds a new study. Researchers evaluated the diets of 2,500 participants parents and non-parents.  Neither group showed statistically significant changes in their intake of calories, fruits and vegetables, sugar-sweetened beverages, or fast food.  The study appears online April 30 in the Journal of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics.

“Parenthood does not lead to significant improvements in diets compared to non-parents, as health practitioners would hope,” lead investigator Dr. Helena LaRoche, of the University of Iowa and the Iowa City VA Medical Center, said in a news release.

Tanya Zuckerbrot, MS, RD, founder of the F-Factor Diet, and director of Nutrition at M Booth’s Better4You, offers some additional exclusive tips for brand managers on the lookout for trends in food and nutrition:

The market for fiber-rich foods and whole grains is booming.  The global market for whole grain and high fiber foods is expected to reach US$27.6b by 2017. Driving this growth are greater consumer awareness of the health benefits associated with dietary fiber and whole grains and new, innovative, better tasting products.  According to Mintel, about 100 new foods with added fiber hit U.S grocery shelves last year including yogurt, water and even non-nutritive sweeteners.

Plant-based protein foods are significantly growing.   Today, there is greater focus on the benefits of protein from plant-based sources that are naturally lower in saturated fat compared to animal sources. A great example of this is Greek yogurt.  A report by Citigroup Global Markets put annual sales of Greek yogurt at $1 billion last year —one-quarter of total yogurt sales of $4.1 billion. Look for Greek yogurt innovations, such as multi-packs, parfaits, frozen treats and new flavors, as well as nonfat Greek yogurt-coated fruits and nuts marketed as healthy snacks.

Tanya Zuckerbrot, MS, RD, founder of the F-Factor Diet, and director of Nutrition at M Booth’s Better4You, offers some exclusive tips for brand managers on the lookout for trends in food and nutrition:

A growing number of people are looking to get nutrition from “real food.” According to a market study conducted by Sloan Trends, Inc., a big trend this year is a move toward “real food nutrition,” with consumers selecting foods based on their health benefits.

• Study data showed the number of people making an effort to serve more nutritious meals is up 6% points between 2009 to 2011 (36% to 42%)
• The study also revealed that users of vitamin supplements are scaling back and opting for food-based nutrition.  Why?  Consumers are better informed about the benefits of “food first” nutrition and some say they are concerned about the quality of and possible long-term effects of supplements.

Consumers are becoming better informed about nutrition.   The Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics Trends 2011 survey found that consumers are hearing more about foods with health-related benefits such as berries and omega-3 rich foods, and people are eating more of them as a result.

• Consumers prefer to eat inherently healthier foods “their way,” rather than cut back on foods they like that may not be as healthy.
• Most consumers get their nutrition news and information from television, and among those 24-44 the internet now leads magazines as their second most used information source. As such, brands have the opportunity to produce web-based content to educate and cultivate key consumer audiences.

As consumers become more food and nutrition-savvy, marketers will need to integrate key messaging across an even wider media mix that includes PR and social media, as well as packaging, websites, social media channels, paid product placement and events.

Interesting battle raging in Washington as the FDA and Council for Responsible Nutrition duke it out over whether the New Dietary Ingredient Draft Guidance should give pre-market approval over new dietary supplement products, as reported in Regulatory Toxicology and Pharmacology.

“The draft guidance attempts to apply the notification requirement to new supplements, not just new ingredients, and it expands the working definition of ‘chemically altered’ to include many changes that were not foreseen in the Congressional Record in 1994,” wrote the commentary’s co-authors Steve Mister, president and CEO of CRN, and John Hathcock, SVP international and regulatory affairs for CRN. “Through these misinterpretations, [the] FDA attempts to impose a food additives-like safety standard and gain de facto pre-market approval against the overt wishes of Congress.”

Re-characterizing many existing dietary ingredients as being chemical alterations could hurt the supplement industry.

Should marketers of better for you diets get nervous because of what a new Harvard study finds?  The most effective way to lose weight is by simply eating less fat and taking more exercise, says a study run by Harvard of 4,000 obese individuals.  The “not rocket science” weight loss formula achieved results in a large proportion of  2,500 obese Americans.  Forty per cent managed to shed 5% or more of their weight, and 20% lost a tenth or  more over a period of 12 months.  Dr Jacinda Nicklas, from Harvard Medical School, who led the dieting study, said: “This is great news because studies have shown that even a 5% reduction in weight can lead to improved health.  The study was reported in the Huff Post.”

Fooducate has launched a mobile app designed to be, in Founder-CEO Hemi Weingarten’s words, a “‘bs’ detector for marketing messages” on packaged foods. And it’s not alone: smartphone-toting consumers are also flocking to apps such as MyFoodWatch, AllergyEats and Don’t Eat That.  The mobile tools are designed to bring a sense of transparency to store aisles, aiding in healthy purchase decisions. With Fooducate, users scan a product bar code, and an algorithm developed with dietitians crunches the ingredient list and nutrition facts and spits out a letter grade. The general rule of thumb: the less processed the food, with fewer fillers or additives, the higher the grade. The app calls out what’s affecting that grade.  Fooducate has been downloaded millions of times and, every week, about 500,000 people use the app or its corresponding website with 75% of the users female.