Food policy dived straight into deep waters as 2013 began. ONS reported December consumer price inflation at 2.7%. Food inflation was ‘only’ 1.2% but 3.3% year-on-year. Unemployment fell. Wages rose 1.4%, less than 2011. Thus, as GDP shrinks, low-paid jobs grow and the consumer food squeeze continues.

Last week, MPs passed the third reading of the Welfare Benefits Up-rating Bill, which goes to the Lords. MPs began to stir. Welfare ‘rationalisation’ actually means low-income people have less money for food.

Three food banks a week are opening. Charity replaces welfare safety nets. Benefits are set below inflation. Those already eating badly will eat less and worse. More cheap horseburgers?

“Like horseburgers, the ‘healthy’ US Coca-Cola ads have been mocked”

The horse DNA story broke on January 15. Horseburgers illustrate what happens when manufacturers are squeezed. The incentive to cut corners and costs triumphs. Why did Ireland’s - not the UK’s - food agency uncover it all? The FSA looks weakened. But so do the mighty retailers.

Tesco researchers phoned me to consult about ‘new’ corporate responsibility (CR). Hmm, I said. I’d take you seriously on obesity and youth if you did something real. Like what? Raise soft drink prices! Withdraw them! You support Mr Lansley’s out-of-date Responsibility Deals, so get real.

Meanwhile, a CR disaster unfolds in the US. The $75bn US soft drinks industry was in court trying to stop Mayor Bloomberg’s ban on selling supersized sugary drinks. Bloomberg - unlike UK politicians - realises fat America is inefficient. New York alone spends about $4bn a year on obesity-related healthcare. He wants New York to be fit. The soft drinks industry thinks it has a right to make the US fat.

In 2007, PepsiCo tiptoed on to a different path - diversifying, talking health. It’s since retreated following investor pressure. Now Coca-Cola is trying old-style hot-air CR. In January, it launched two-minute ads on US TV. Lots of slim people with the message ‘burn it off, take exercise’. Like horseburgers, it’s been mocked.

Last but not least, what about David Cameron’s EU referendum promise? Let me say only this: a country that only half feeds itself is debating leaving where it gets half the extra food!

Tim Lang is professor of food policy, City University London

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