With thanks to Marion Nestle who first reported on this in her Food Politics blog.
While the Recipe for Success Foundation team scrapes our knees to raise the money for our charitable work to turn back the clock on childhood obesity and the debilitating diseases it causes, the global investment community is gleefully anticipating the business opportunities this tragic pandemic lays at their feet.
A recent press release on a research report from Bank of America Merrill Lynch, Globesity--The Global Fight Against Obesity, tells investors:
"Increasing efforts to tackle obesity over the coming decades will form an important new investment theme for fund managers...Global obesity is a mega-investment theme for the next 25 years and beyond...The report...identifies that efforts to reduce obesity is a "megatrend" with a shelf-life of 25 to 50 years...BofA Merrill Lynch analysts across several sectors have collaborated to identify the sectors and companies developing long-term solutions.
Given the worldwide increase in obesity, its high prospective costs, and the ever-present threat of government regulation, the report identifies more than 50 global stocks that provide investment opportunities for fighting "globesity." These fall into four categories:
1. Pharmaceuticals and Health Care: companies taking advantage of the FDA's increased support for obesity drug development; tackling related medical conditions and needs including diabetes, kidney failure, hip and knee implants; making equipment such as patient lifts, bigger beds and wider ambulance doors.
2. Food: companies accessing the $663 billion "health and wellness" market and reformulating portfolios to respond to increasing pressure such as "fat taxes" to reduce sugar and fat levels.
3. Commercial Weight Loss, Diet Management and Nutrition: companies pursuing dieting, nutrition and behavioral change--a $4 billion market in the U.S. and growing globally.
4. Sports Apparel and Equipment: "This is the longer-term play, but we believe that promoting physical activity will become a key priority for more government health policies."
I don't know about you, but I am heartsick that the focus is on reaping financial rewards from this killing trend rather than combining all resources to bring it to an early end. We all know that the contributing factors to obesity are mulit-layered and some stem from changes to our built environment and hereditary issues, but most are a direct result of the high margin junk and processed food industry. So the very business investors who made billions helping create this problem now stand to profit the most from "solving" it.
It's only 8:00 a.m., but I may be forced to have a drink.
