IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jijerp/v17y2020i5p1624-d327716.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Food Industry Donations to Academic Programs: A Cross-Sectional Examination of the Extent of Publicly Available Data

Author

Listed:
  • Marie A. Bragg

    (Department of Population Health, New York University School of Medicine, New York, NY 10016, USA
    Department of Nutrition, New York University School of Global Public Health, New York, NY 10012, USA)

  • Brian Elbel

    (Department of Population Health, New York University School of Medicine, New York, NY 10016, USA
    New York University Wagner School of Public Policy, New York, NY 10021, USA)

  • Marion Nestle

    (Department of Nutrition and Food Studies, New York University Steinhardt School of Culture, Education, and Human Development, New York, NY 10003, USA)

Abstract

No studies have documented the prevalence of the food industry’s funding of academic programs, which is problematic because such funding can create conflicts of interest in research and clinical practice. We aimed to quantify the publicly available information on the food industry’s donations to academic programs by documenting the amount of donations given over time, categorizing the types of academic programs that receive food industry donations, cataloguing the source of the donation information, and identifying any stated reasons for donations. Researchers cataloged online data from publicly available sources (e.g., official press releases, news articles, tax documents) on the food industry’s donations to academic programs from 2000 to 2016. Companies included 26 food and beverage corporations from the 2016 Fortune 500 list in the United States. Researchers recorded the: (1) monetary value of the donations; (2) years the donations were distributed; (3) the name and type of recipient; (4) source of donation information; and (5) reasons for donations. Adjusting for inflation, we identified $366 million in food industry donations (N = 3274) to academic programs. Universities received 45.2% ( n = 1480) of donations but accounted for 67.9% of total dollars given in the sample. Community colleges, schools (i.e., preschool, elementary, middle, and high schools), and academic nonprofits, institutes, foundations, and research hospitals collectively received 54.8% of the donations, but made up less than one-third of the monetary value of donations. Half of the donations (49.0%) did not include a stated reason for the donation. In our sample, donations grew from $3 million in 2000 to $24 million in 2016. Food companies in our sample donated millions of dollars to universities and other academic programs but disclosed little information on the purpose of the donations. Achieving transparency in donation practices may only be possible if federal policies begin to require disclosures or if companies voluntarily disclose information.

Suggested Citation

  • Marie A. Bragg & Brian Elbel & Marion Nestle, 2020. "Food Industry Donations to Academic Programs: A Cross-Sectional Examination of the Extent of Publicly Available Data," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 17(5), pages 1-15, March.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:17:y:2020:i:5:p:1624-:d:327716
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/17/5/1624/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/17/5/1624/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Shelley, D. & Ogedegbe, G. & Elbel, B., 2014. "Same strategy different industry: Corporate influence on public policy," American Journal of Public Health, American Public Health Association, vol. 104(4), pages 9-11.
    2. Farrelly, M.C. & Davis, K.C. & Haviland, M.L. & Messeri, P. & Healton, C.G., 2005. "Evidence of a dose-response relationship between "truth" antismoking ads and youth smoking prevalence," American Journal of Public Health, American Public Health Association, vol. 95(3), pages 425-431.
    3. Diels, Johan & Cunha, Mario & Manaia, Célia & Sabugosa-Madeira, Bernardo & Silva, Margarida, 2011. "Association of financial or professional conflict of interest to research outcomes on health risks or nutritional assessment studies of genetically modified products," Food Policy, Elsevier, vol. 36(2), pages 197-203, April.
    4. Maira Bes-Rastrollo & Matthias B Schulze & Miguel Ruiz-Canela & Miguel A Martinez-Gonzalez, 2013. "Financial Conflicts of Interest and Reporting Bias Regarding the Association between Sugar-Sweetened Beverages and Weight Gain: A Systematic Review of Systematic Reviews," PLOS Medicine, Public Library of Science, vol. 10(12), pages 1-9, December.
    5. Alexander Chernev & Sean Blair, 2015. "Doing Well by Doing Good: The Benevolent Halo of Corporate Social Responsibility," Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Consumer Research Inc., vol. 41(6), pages 1412-1425.
    6. Lenard I Lesser & Cara B Ebbeling & Merrill Goozner & David Wypij & David S Ludwig, 2007. "Relationship between Funding Source and Conclusion among Nutrition-Related Scientific Articles," PLOS Medicine, Public Library of Science, vol. 4(1), pages 1-6, January.
    7. World Health Organization, 2009. "Tobacco Industry Interference with Tobacco Control," University of California at San Francisco, Center for Tobacco Control Research and Education qt98w687x5, Center for Tobacco Control Research and Education, UC San Francisco.
    8. Daniele Mandrioli & Cristin E Kearns & Lisa A Bero, 2016. "Relationship between Research Outcomes and Risk of Bias, Study Sponsorship, and Author Financial Conflicts of Interest in Reviews of the Effects of Artificially Sweetened Beverages on Weight Outcomes:," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 11(9), pages 1-20, September.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Alysa Miller & Omni Cassidy & Tenay Greene & Josh Arshonsky & Stephanie L. Albert & Marie A. Bragg, 2021. "A Qualitative Analysis of Black and White Adolescents’ Perceptions of and Responses to Racially Targeted Food and Drink Commercials on Television," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 18(21), pages 1-15, November.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Béné, Christophe, 2022. "Why the Great Food Transformation may not happen – A deep-dive into our food systems’ political economy, controversies and politics of evidence," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 154(C).
    2. Scott, C. & Hawkins, B. & Knai, C., 2017. "Food and beverage product reformulation as a corporate political strategy," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 172(C), pages 37-45.
    3. Campbell, Norah & Mialon, Melissa & Reilly, Kathryn & Browne, Sarah & Finucane, Francis M., 2020. "How are frames generated? Insights from the industry lobby against the sugar tax in Ireland," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 264(C).
    4. Barrios, John & Lancieri, Filippo Maria & Levy, Joshua & Singh, Shashank & Valletti, Tommaso M. & Zingales, Luigi, 2024. "The conflict-of-interest discount in the marketplace of ideas," Working Papers 348, The University of Chicago Booth School of Business, George J. Stigler Center for the Study of the Economy and the State.
    5. Thomas Guillemaud & Eric Lombaert & Denis Bourguet, 2016. "Conflicts of Interest in GM Bt Crop Efficacy and Durability Studies," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 11(12), pages 1-14, December.
    6. Gary Sacks & Devorah Riesenberg & Melissa Mialon & Sarah Dean & Adrian J Cameron, 2020. "The characteristics and extent of food industry involvement in peer-reviewed research articles from 10 leading nutrition-related journals in 2018," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 15(12), pages 1-15, December.
    7. Golder, Su & McCambridge, Jim, 2021. "Alcohol, cardiovascular disease and industry funding: A co-authorship network analysis of systematic reviews," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 289(C).
    8. Yusen Dong & Senhua Chen & Yixue Wu, 2023. "Keeping up with the Joneses: The role of investee peers corporate environmental responsibility," Corporate Social Responsibility and Environmental Management, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 30(4), pages 1841-1855, July.
    9. Marcinkowska Elzbieta & Sawicka Joanna, 2023. "Corporate Social Responsibility as a Factor Influencing Purchasing Decisions of Consumers in Central and Eastern Europe," European Research Studies Journal, European Research Studies Journal, vol. 0(4), pages 281-299.
    10. Antoine Popelut & Fabien Valet & Olivier Fromentin & Aurélie Thomas & Philippe Bouchard, 2010. "Relationship between Sponsorship and Failure Rate of Dental Implants: A Systematic Approach," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 5(4), pages 1-9, April.
    11. Alexander Ivanov & Beata A Kaczkowska & Saadat A Khan & Jean Ho & Morteza Tavakol & Ashok Prasad & Geetha Bhumireddy & Allan F Beall & Igor Klem & Parag Mehta & William M Briggs & Terrence J Sacchi & , 2017. "Review and Analysis of Publication Trends over Three Decades in Three High Impact Medicine Journals," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 12(1), pages 1-11, January.
    12. Menno D. T. Jong & Mark Meer, 2017. "How Does It Fit? Exploring the Congruence Between Organizations and Their Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) Activities," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 143(1), pages 71-83, June.
    13. Xu, Chengxin & Li, Huafang, 2021. "Resource Publicness Matters in Organizational Perceptions," OSF Preprints 7q3v8, Center for Open Science.
    14. Haiying Wei & Yaxuan Ran, 2019. "Male Versus Female: How the Gender of Apologizers Influences Consumer Forgiveness," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 154(2), pages 371-387, January.
    15. Elizabeth C. Hair & David R. Holtgrave & Alexa R. Romberg & Morgane Bennett & Jessica M. Rath & Megan C. Diaz & Donna M. Vallone, 2019. "Cost-Effectiveness of Using Mass Media to Prevent Tobacco Use among Youth and Young Adults: The FinishIt Campaign," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 16(22), pages 1-9, November.
    16. Christina Schamp & Mark Heitmann & Robin Katzenstein, 2019. "Consideration of ethical attributes along the consumer decision-making journey," Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, Springer, vol. 47(2), pages 328-348, March.
    17. David C. Colston & Yanmei Xie & James F. Thrasher & Sherry Emery & Megan E. Patrick & Andrea R. Titus & Michael R. Elliott & Nancy L. Fleischer, 2021. "Exploring How Exposure to Truth and State-Sponsored Anti-Tobacco Media Campaigns Affect Smoking Disparities among Young Adults Using a National Longitudinal Dataset, 2002–2017," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 18(15), pages 1-11, July.
    18. Ioannis Ioannou & George Kassinis & Giorgos Papagiannakis, 2023. "The Impact of Perceived Greenwashing on Customer Satisfaction and the Contingent Role of Capability Reputation," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 185(2), pages 333-347, June.
    19. Weldon, Isaac & Parkhurst, Justin, 2022. "Governing evidence use in the nutrition policy process: evidence and lessons from the 2020 Canada food guide," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 112430, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    20. Eunsoon Lee & Gyu-il Lee, 2021. "Perceived Exposure and Acceptance Model of Appearance-Related Health Campaigns: Roles of Parents’ Healthy-Appearance Talk, Self-Objectification, and Interpersonal Conversations," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(6), pages 1-16, March.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:17:y:2020:i:5:p:1624-:d:327716. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.