Calories and beverage choices

Photo: Geoff R

At Zenith’s Global Bottled Water Congress in Budapest earlier in October, the chairman and CEO of global market leader Nestlé Waters, Marco Settembri, made some dramatic statements.

He asked, “Can we in bottled water make a difference in public health?” He answered, “I believe we can. People are not drinking enough water and are consuming too many calories from sugar-sweetened beverages, the usefulness of which is questioned by science.”

He showed a video illustrating the behaviour of 13,000 students in the US when faced with a choice between two vending machines next to each other. One contained sugar-sweetened beverages, the other bottled water. An ‘out of order’ sign was put on the bottled water machine. What happened? Did everyone walk away to find tap water? In fact, 63% chose a sugar-sweetened beverage instead.

He underlined that bottled water and tap water complement each other in increasing water consumption and urged the bottled water industry to promote the pleasure of drinking water.

Richard Hall is chairman of Zenith International. This is a personal blog and views expressed are his own.