What to Eat: An Aisle-by-Aisle Guide to Savvy Food Choices and Good Eating (2006), along with two previous books, Food Politics: How the Food Industry Influences Nutrition and Health (revised edition, 2007) and Safe Food: Bacteria, Biotechnology, and Bioterrorism (2003). CenterScene interviewed Nestle in advance of her upcoming appearance at the Center for Healthy Communities.

CenterScene: Today, public interest in healthy eating and food issues is high. But you were working on these topics long before they became so popular. What are the biggest changes you’ve seen since you started doing this work? Do you feel more or less optimistic as time goes by?

Marion Nestle: I’d say the biggest change is the enormous outpouring of interest in food issues as a way of instituting social change. I see what’s happening around food issues as a new social movement and an exceptionally democratic one—of the people, by the people, for the people.
This is grassroots democracy in action. The movement isn’t particularly organized or united, but it is highly diverse and encompasses many interests: slow food, fair food, safe food, school food, anti-marketing to kids, and on and on. Here’s something people can do that will truly make a difference to health and to the environment. Everyone eats and everyone can vote with their forks. Who wouldn’t be optimistic?!

CenterScene: To prevent obesity and other impacts of unhealthy eating, what are some systemic changes that we need to move toward as a society?

MN: We need to change society to make it easier for people to eat more healthfully. Right now, the default is to eat too much of the wrong kinds of foods. That has to do with the way our farm system is organized, the power of Wall Street to influence corporations, and the power of corporations to influence government actions. We have far too much food in this country—3,900 calories per person per day, about twice the average need. To sell its products, the food industry has created an environment that encourages people to eat more. It’s not that food companies want to make people fat. They just want to sell more food in a competitive environment.

CenterScene: Can the philanthropic community play a role in supporting positive change around food and health?

MN: Definitely. I can think of lots of research, intervention, education, or planning projects that might help create a healthier food environment or one that better promotes physical activity. Nobody really knows how to reverse the societal changes that have taken place in the past 20 years or so. We have to work with what we are faced with now. My favorite place to start is with children. Let’s teach kids how to think critically about marketing, how to cook, where food comes from, and how to ride bicycles. And that’s just for starters.