April is Minority Health Month and this year’s theme is “Man Up for Health: Healthy Men Move Our Communities Forward.” PepsiCo applauds the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services for highlighting the need to help men, especially minority men, realize that they have much more control over their health than they may think. Men, particularly African-American and Hispanic men, are at higher risk for serious health conditions like heart disease, stroke and diabetes. However, many of the conditions that increase their health risk are preventable through lifestyle changes like diet and exercise. Of the 10 leading causes of death in men, six (eating less fat, eating more fruits and vegetables, lowering sodium, etc) are directly influenced by diet and exercise choices. PepsiCo can help make it easier than expected to improve diets via our expanding global portfolio of healthier products. Many of our products can make... Read more

Getting the right nutrition within the right number of calories is a tricky balance every day.  That’s why PepsiCo is making it easier for people to understand and manage the calories they consume by committing to displaying calorie information on all products around the world by 2012, and increasing the range of foods and beverages that offer solutions for managing daily calorie intake. To help meet this goal, our designers are working to repackage products into single-serve offerings that better enable calorie control.  For example, Frito-Lay has expanded its product portfolio offerings through portion-controlled snack packs, including 100-calorie packs and single serve packs.  Quaker has introduced 90-calorie packs of such favorites as Quaker Chewy Granola Bars and Quaker Granola Bites. We are also clearly labeling the calorie content and nutrition profile of our products to help consumers manage their daily energy needs. In the U.S. for example,... Read more

As part of PepsiCo’s promise to encourage people to live healthier we recently announced aggressive, industry leading goals. One of these goals, which will make a difference in the diets of millions of people, is to reduce the average amount of added sugar per serving in key global beverage brands, in key countries, by 25 percent by 2020 which includes our efforts started in 2006. People drink a variety of beverages throughout the day and at PepsiCo we pride ourselves on the fact that we have something for everyone – Tropicana for breakfast, Pepsi Max for lunch, Aquafina for hydration, and Gatorade post-workout for example.  American consumers get just over 20% of their daily calories through beverages so by implementing this added sugar goal across our portfolio, we intend to reduce the amount of sugar in millions of diets. In support of our commitment we are already... Read more

In this brief, 5 minute podcast, PepsiCo nutritionists Danielle Greenberg, PhD, and Joy Dubost, PhD, RD discuss what research shows about the differences between High Fructose Corn Syrup, natural sweeteners and table sugar, and the relationship between diet beverages and weight gain. Read more

In order to highlight the importance of World Health Day, we asked Derek Yach, PepsiCo’s Senior Vice President for Global Health Policy, a few questions. What is World Health Day? World Health Day 2010 is today, April 7. The theme this year is ‘1000 cities, 1000 lives’ and the focus is on opening up public spaces to health – via things like activities in parks, town hall meetings, clean-up campaigns, or closing off portions of streets to motorized vehicles. The World Health Organization aims to collect 1000 stories of urban health champions who have taken action and had a significant impact on health in their cities. Events are being held this week in cities all over the world in order to promote health in urban areas. Why the focus on urbanization and health? Currently over 3 billion people live in cities and over the next 30 years virtually all... Read more