Concern over the lack of clarity on the industry's role at September UN High Level Meeting on NCDs

In a joint statement addressed to President of the UN General Assembly, the Permanent Representative of Luxembourg and the Permanent Representative of Jamaica, the 51 organisations expressed their support to the objective of raising the profile of NCDs globally but showed concern about the lack of clarity regarding the role of the private sector at the upcoming Civil Society Interactive Hearing in New York and UN High Level Meeting (UN HLM) in September.

The organisations have called on the UN to:

1. Recognise and distinguish between industry including business-interest not-for-profit

organisations (BINGOs) and public interest non-governmental organisations (PINGOs) that are both currently under the ‘Civil Society’ umbrella without distinction.

2. Develop a ‘code of conduct’ that sets out a clear framework for engaging the food and beverage industry and managing conflicts of interest, and which differentiates between policy development and implementation.

3. Address and acknowledge these concerns ahead of the UN High Level Summit in September.

Since the major causes of preventable death are those diseases related to tobacco, diet, physical inactivity and alcohol drinking, the organisations are concerned about the fact that many of the proposals to address NCDs call for ‘partnerships’ with no clarification of what this actually means. Public-private partnerships in these areas can frustrate efforts to regulate harmful marketing practices.

It is essential that a strong and clear policy on conflicts of interest is established by the international community to provide Member States with guidance to identify conflicts, eliminate those that are not permissible and manage those considered, based on thorough risk/benefit analysis, acceptable.

Transparency, although an essential requirement and first step, is not a sufficient safeguard in and of itself against negative impacts of conflicts of interest.

In the joint statement the organizations propose that the following framework be used as a basis for a ‘code of conduct’ for industry:

The policy development stage should be free from industry involvement to ensure a “health in all policies” approach, which is not compromised by the obvious conflicts of interests associated with the food alcohol, beverage and other industries, who are primarily answerable to shareholders.

The food and beverage industry should, of course, be kept informed about policy development, through stakeholder briefings for example, but should not be in an influencing position when it comes to setting policy and strategies for addressing public health issues, such as NCD prevention and control.

While it is important for the food and beverage industries to be in dialogue during the policy development process, this should be as a means of informing the process relating to practical issues rather than as members of the policy development team.

When it comes to NCDs, industries are both part of the problem and the solution. It is vital therefore to engage them in the most appropriate way when implementing policy and not when developing policy, to ensure that public health policy is protected from commercial interests.

Without this approach, WHO’s principles of democratic policy-making for health, its constitutional mandate of the attainment of the highest possible level of health for all, and its independence, integrity and effectiveness will be undermined. 1

Without such a policy, conflicts of interest can become institutionalised as the norm, impacting on the authority of governments. Industries with a strong interest in the outcome will increasingly assume greater roles in policy and decision shaping.

This can fundamentally compromise and distort international and national public health priorities and policies.

The conflict of interest concern is not limited to the direct involvement of industry. UN agencies, including the WHO, are unanimous in recognising the important contributions NGOs make in the area of public health and are aware of the growth of these organisations in their numbers and influence in health at global, regional and national levels, including in the area of NCDs. However, the WHO and others have so far not made a clear distinction between BINGOs (business-interest NGOs not-for-profit organisations that are set up by, representing or closely linked to, business interests) and PINGOs - public-interest NGOs. This failure to distinguish between the two groupings exacerbates any existing lack of transparency and complicates the implementation of any procedures which aim to manage the role of these actors in policy and standard-setting consultations.

In the Civil Society Interactive Hearing on 16th June, there was no clear differentiation between groups within Civil Society. The voice of Civil Society ought to reflect only public health interests.

The safeguards in Article 5.3 of the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control, the WHO International Code of Marketing of Breast-milk Substitutes Resolutions on Infant and Young Child Nutrition and the Global Strategy on Diet, Physical Activity and Health can be used among other helpful tools to establish measures that go beyond individual conflicts of interests, and address institutional conflicts of interest.

In summary, the 51 organisations call on the UN to recognise and distinguish between BINGOs and PINGOs that are currently under the ‘Civil Society’ umbrella and to develop a ‘code of conduct’ framework for industry engagement that differentiates between policy development and implementation. They have requested that their comments are taken into account for the UN High Level Meeting in September.

1 UN Joint Inspection Unit Paper. United Nations corporate partnerships: The role and functioning of the Global Compact www.unjiu.org/data/reports/2010/JIU.REP.2010.9_For%20Printing_17%20January%202011.pdf

Beyond Pragmatism: Appraising UN-Business Partnerships:

http://www.unrisd.org/80256B3C005BE6B5/(search)/DFE614E0A0ACA2BCC12573070033BB77?Opendocument&highlight=2,be yond,pragmatism&fromsearch=yes&query=beyond+pragmatism

1. Aktionsgruppe Babyhahrung (Germany)
2. All India Drug Action Network
3. Alliance Against Conflict of Interest (AACI)
4. Association for Accountancy and Business Affairs
5. Australian Breastfeeding Association
6. Baby Milk Action
7. Biomedical Research Centre for Maternal and Child Healthcare (IRCCS) (Italy)
8. Brazilian Institute for Consumers Defense (IDEC)
9. Brazilian Front for the Regulation of Food Advertising (Frente pela Regulacao da Publicidade de Alimentos)
10. Caroline Walker Trust (UK)
11. Consumers International
12. Berne Declaration (Switzerland)
13. Borstvoeding vzw (Belgium)
14. Breastfeeding Promotion Network of India
15. Corporate Accountability International
16. Centre for Science in the Public Interest (Canada)
17. Consumers International
18. Earth Dharma Farm (USA)
19. European Alcohol Policy Alliance – Eurocare
20. European Heart Network
21. Europe Third World Centre (CETIM)
22. Initiative for Health & Equality in Society (India)
23. Institute of Nutrition of the Rio de Janeiro State University (Brazil)
24. International Baby Food Action Network (IBFAN)
25. Global Alcohol Policy Alliance
26. Health Action International (HAI) Africa
27. Health Action Asia Pacific
28. Health Action International (Global)
29. Health Action International Europe
30. Health Consumer Protection (Thailand)
31. IBFAN Italia
32. International Association of Consumer Food Organisations (IACFO) ,
33. International Baby Food Action Network (IBFAN)
34. INFACT Canada
35. Initiativ Liewensufank (Luxembourg)
36. Medicus Mundi International Network
37. National Childbirth Trust
38. National Heart Forum (UK)
39. Network for Accountability of Tobacco Transnationals
40. No grazie, pago io (Italy)
41. Osservatorio Italiano Sulla Salute Globale (Italy)
42. Prevention Institute (USA)
43. StopDrink Network (Thailand)
44. Sustain Children’s Food Campaign
45. Sweet Enough Network (Thailand)
46. The Breastfeeding Centre (Thailand)
47. Sindicato dos Nutricionista do Estado de São Paulo (Trade Union of Nutritionists of the State of Sao Paulo)
48. Universities Allied for Essential Medicine
49. World Alliance for Breastfeeding Action
50. World Cancer Research Fund International
51. WEMOS (The Netherlands)