What’s New December 2010

This page lists changes to this site for December 2010.

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The permanent link for this update is:

http://www.globalissues.org/whatsnew/2010/december.

World Health Organization figures show increasing obesity around the world between 2002 and 2010. Attempts to address obesity are proving challenging with governments and industry resisting pressures to regulate advertising or to tax junk food, etc. Some concerns about the effectiveness of such proposals may be justified, but other times it feels like a battle of health versus profits.

As global obesity has been on the increase in recent years, many health and campaign organizations have increased pressure on the food industry to be more responsible in their advertising to children. A number of companies have pledged to address such concerns but so far it seems that not much has actually happened.

A small update to the global financial crisis page looks at further examples of structural adjustment-like policies for industrialized nations. This example is Iceland, which like Ireland, has had a banking crisis. However, Ireland has gone the route of publicly backing the banks’ debts, thus socializing the risks. The Irish population is already bearing the brunt of a recession with austerity measures, but the recent bailout by the EU, IMF and others puts more pressure on the public.

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