An eminent agricultural economist of Amritsar Dr. Gursharan Singh Kainth added another feather to the district. Dr Kainth’s easy on Unethical Food Marketing to Children was adjudged First prize in the essay competition organized jointly by the Ministry of Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution and Yojana of Ministry of Information and Broadcasting Government of India.

Dr Gursharan Singh Kainth Director GAD Institute of Development Studies said that children have mastered the knack to continuously asking for what they want and change their persuasion techniques from pleading to crying to threatening. Parents who are tired or stressed feel the easy way out to give in to the child’s demands thus contributing to increasing to Pester Power. Aggressive marketing of fast food, soft drinks and candy to children results in a country of over weight children. Advertisers were doing a big disservice to the society as well as to the country.

Dr Kainth suggests that the industry and government should develop responsible self regulatory practice for marketing of kids while permitting companies to compete vigorously in the growing market for healthier food. Food companies and advertising industry should think about their responsibilities to children not about their rights to exploit them. The industy should develop tough and effective marketing guidelines, but when private interest work against the public good like this, governmet is obliged to act.

There is an urgent need to establish robust international standards to protect children’s well beings by curbing commercial practices which exploit children’s credulity, contribute to unhealthy consumption patterns and hinder the efforts of parents, governments and society to improve children’s diet. Government must adopt necessary measure to protect children from commercial communications that encourage unhealthy diets as apart of comprehensive efforts to improve children’s diets.