Legislative News

House Approves Tobacco Advertising Bill
By a 326-102 vote, the House approved H.R. 1108, the Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act. The bill would grant the Food and Drug Administration authority over tobacco advertising, rather than the Federal Trade Commission, and would direct the secretary of Health and Human Services to publish an interim rule enacting several unprecedented advertising restrictions, resulting in a de facto ban on most tobacco advertising. Specifically, the bill would and require all tobacco ads to be black text on a white background, except in certain print media with an adult audience, and would ban all outdoor tobacco advertising within any elementary or secondary school or playground.

FTC Reports on Food Marketing to Children
The Federal Trade Commission released the results of a children's food marketing study, finding that the food and beverage industries have made significant self-regulation progress in the past three years. The FTC calculated that 44 major food and beverage companies spent $1.6 billion to promote products to American children under 18 in 2006 using integrated campaigns combining traditional media with packaging, point-of-purchase, sweepstakes and the Internet. The Institutes of Medicine had previously estimated that food companies spent $10 billion annually on advertising to children. The FTC has again lauded industry self-regulation; both the Children's Advertising Review Unit and the Children's Food and Beverage Advertising Initiative were cited as positive efforts.

Children's Food Advertising Initiative Working, According to Study
The Council of Better Business Bureaus has released its own report on its Children's Food & Beverage Advertising Initiative, announcing overwhelming compliance with companies' pledge obligations. Their review, based on advertising disseminated July–December 2007, found that the companies' involvement in the initiative has resulted in a substantial shift toward the promotion of better-for-you foods. Moreover, most of the companies who pledged a timetable for transitioning its advertising bested their schedule goals.

CPSC Bill Sent to President
The House and Senate have approved a bill designed to reform the Consumer Products Safety Commission and rejected a proposal to require onerous cautionary statements in many advertisements for children's products. The original Senate bill called for any advertisement for a toy, game, balloon, small ball or marble that requires a cautionary statement to include the statement in or immediately adjacent to the ad. Instead, the House and Senate approved the House version, which would require a cautionary statement in advertisements only when the ad provides a direct means to purchase the toy—such as Internet or catalog advertising.