Junk Food and Chinese Milk

Welcome back Food Junglers. Apologies for the late issue; it seems as though my postgraduate studies have been taking up a lot of my time recently. Anyways, this past week has been heavily focused on inflation and, more so, how both companies and governments have been trying to adapt to inflation-weary customers. Let’s dig in.

This week:

☕️ Brazil’s climate disaster is affecting one of its largest exports.

🍔 The UK is banning the advertising of junk food on TV.

🍝 Olive Garden wants to find a way to recover flagging sales.

🥛 There is too much milk in China.

♻️ A restaurant in North Carolina is cooking with a European mindset…

CLIMATE
BRAZIL’S FEELING THE HEAT

Forest fires, continuous pesticide use, and more than seven decades of supra-natural temperatures have ravaged forests in Brazil, decimating coffee plantations and forcing coffee production to slow down across the country.

Brazil’s coffee harvest season, which ends next month, virtually fell flat compared to last year. Especially with coffee demand in Asia skyrocketing, this complicates things for the 2025-26 season.

The government of the largest coffee producer in the world blamed deliberate, criminal fire-setting for the forest fires.

ZOOMING OUT: To make matters worse, Vietnam - the second-largest coffee producer in the world - has been struggling with severe drought. So, the world will wait to see how coffee production and prices will fare in the long run.

POLICY
UK BANS JUNK FOOD ADS

The UK government will officially be enforcing a nationwide ban on junk food advertising, starting this time next year, in an attempt to tackle childhood obesity.

The policy is being spearheaded by Health Minister Andrew Gwynne, who aims to prohibit the advertisement of high-fat, salt, and sugar products on TV before 9 p.m.

Escalating healthcare costs and high food inflation in the UK are two of the most important factors behind this policy. Hopefully, this will also ease pressure on the National Health Service, which is struggling to manage the high number of preventable diseases linked to poor diet.

ZOOMING OUT: For the UK, restrictions on unhealthy foods are nothing new, as a tax on sugary drinks has already been a thing in the country for quite some time.

I’m curious to see, though, how the food industry will adapt to regulatory changes and whether healthier options will be the main focus.

BUSINESS
OLIVE GARDEN ADAPTS

Lagging sales and inflation-weary customers in the US have motivated Italian chain Olive Garden, to change their menu offerings and add items that were only available during the pandemic. 

Along with endless pasta, Olive Garden is looking to bring back its steak gorgonzola Alfredo and stuffed chicken marsala to appeal to customers who are now inclined to eat at home.

And, in an attempt to increase sales further, Olive Garden also announced that it’s teaming up with Uber to offer third-party delivery service for the first time.

ZOOMING OUT: Sales softness isn’t unique to Olive Garden, as restaurants - from McDonald’s to Domino’s - have all struggled to maintain sales. My question for Olive Garden, though, is whether moving into delivery and discount meal deals is the right fit for the company.

SUPPLY CHAIN
CHINA HAS TOO MUCH MILK

In addition to an ongoing grain surplus, China is suffering from too much dairy, as falling birth rates and cost-conscious consumers are no longer buying as much milk.

The world’s third-largest milk producer and largest importer of food is currently experiencing a few economic setbacks, to the point where milk consumption has fallen from 14.4 kg per capita in 2021 to 12.4 kg in 2022.

Meanwhile, Chinese milk production has surpassed all expectations, thus forcing many smaller farmers out of business and squeezing shipments into the country.

ZOOMING OUT: The whole saga behind China’s oversupply of key ingredients, including milk, was based on the government’s push for greater food self-sufficiency, coupled with a stable economy.

Now that economic growth has become sluggish, President Xi Jinping is going to have to come up with something new.

THE BRIGHT SIDE
COOKING LOCALLY

Food Jungle wouldn’t be a newsletter that reflected my interests if I didn’t at least OCCASIONALLY write about some of the great restaurant concepts that are popping up across the world.

North Carolina-based Anastasia Worrell is a fantastic chef who is pioneering “zero-kilometre” cooking at her restaurant, The Green House, in which she sources ingredients that are as local as possible.

While this may be a common occurrence in European restaurants, the same cannot be said in the United States, where many ingredients come from industrialised farms. So, the Moldovan-born chef is really doing something new here that deserves attention.

Her menu is entirely plant-based, and she’s even said on Bloomberg that her lion’s mane mushroom supplier is a guy who lives downtown. It just makes me happy that there is a growing trend of American restaurants that are recognising the benefits - both in terms of taste and sustainability - of local produce. Jungle approved ✅ 

BEFORE YOU GO…

• Coca Cola plans to invest $1 billion in its Nigeria operations over the next five years.

• Donald Trump has threatened to slap a 200% tariff on John Deere if the farm-equipment maker starts selling made-in-Mexico equipment previously made in the U.S.

• Mondelēz International has announced plans to acquire a majority stake in Evirth, a Chinese manufacturer of cakes and pastries, as part of its strategy to enhance its footprint in the rapidly growing frozen-to-chilled desserts market.

• Nestlé claims it has invented the first 70% dark chocolate made entirely from the cocoa fruit and zero refined sugar.

• Colombia’s capital - Bogotá - has tightened restrictions on water use after the lowest rainfall in more than half a century stops low reservoir levels from recovering.

TAKE A BREAK

If you’re interested in some quality ORIGINAL journalism on what’s been going on in the food industry, look no further than Green Queen.

Founded in 2011, by Sonalie Figueiras, the team looks to analyse and discuss the latest news in food, from cultivated meat to food waste. Thoroughly recommend! 🤩