Vani Hari Popular Books

Vani Hari Biography & Facts

Vani Deva Hari (born March 22, 1979), who blogs as the Food Babe, is an American author, activist, and affiliate marketer who criticizes the food industry. She started the Food Babe blog in 2011, and it received over 54 million views in 2014. She is a New York Times best-selling author, and companies such as Chick-fil-A and Kraft may have changed or reconsidered ingredients in their products following her campaigns. Hari's ideas on food safety have been criticized by scientists as pseudoscience and chemophobia, and others have drawn attention to her financial interest through promotion and marketing of natural foods. Career Born in Charlotte, North Carolina to Indian immigrant parents from Punjab, India, Hari first attended the University of Georgia before transferring to University of North Carolina at Charlotte. After graduating in 2001 with a degree in computer science, she worked as a management consultant for Accenture. In her early 20s, Hari was hospitalized with appendicitis. In response, she began looking into health and nutrition issues. She started the Food Babe blog in 2011, and left Accenture in 2012 to devote her time to activism and blogging, as well as marketing dietary and other products. By 2014, her blog was receiving over 54 million views. Hari has over 97,000 Twitter followers, and an official Facebook page with over one million likes. She refers to her followers and supporters as the "Food Babe Army." Hari has capitalised on her following by selling books, subscriptions to her eating guide, meal plans, products through which she gains affiliate commissions, and through marketing her own line of supplements under the Truvani brand. Critics argue that the controversy she engenders through her activism helps drive sales through her site. Activism In 2011, Hari wrote a piece about ingredients in Chick-fil-A sandwiches which she alleged to be harmful. Chick-fil-A responded to Hari's post in May 2012, inviting her to its headquarters in Atlanta to discuss her concerns. As part of a larger effort to improve the nutrition of their products, Chick-fil-A announced in late 2013 it was removing dyes, corn syrup, and TBHQ from their products. They also announced a plan to only use antibiotic-free chickens within the next five years. Hari has said that President Barack Obama did not keep a promise that he made during his 2008 presidential campaign to force the labeling of genetically modified food (GMOs). During the 2012 Democratic National Convention, which she attended as an elected delegate, Hari sat in the first row on the convention floor and held a sign that read "Label GMOs!" during Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack's speech. In 2012, Hari wrote a blog post regarding Chipotle describing her quest to get clear answers about what Chipotle used in their food, saying: "Most of their food was contaminated with genetically modified cooking oil, corn oil, and they were using genetically modified ingredients in their tortillas. Even in the black beans there was GMO soybean oil. You couldn't even order vegetarian and avoid it. It was really unfortunate. Then, when I saw their flour tortillas' package, it said that they use trans-fat. That's crazy." After she published her blog post, Chipotle set up a meeting with Hari where she urged them to publish their ingredients publicly. In March 2013, Chipotle's Communications Director emailed Hari with a link to a new page on Chipotle's website with the ingredients in all of their menu items, along with a statement on the sidebar, "Our goal is to eliminate GMOs from Chipotle's ingredients, and we're working hard to meet this challenge." In April 2015, Chipotle followed up on their commitment to remove GMO ingredients from their food and became the first national restaurant chain to use only non-GMO ingredients. In March 2013, Hari posted her first petition on Change.org asking Kraft Foods to remove FD&C yellow#5 and FD&C yellow#6 food dyes from their Mac & Cheese. On April 1, 2013, Hari visited Kraft headquarters in Chicago bringing along a petition with over 270,000 signatures and met with executives. Following Hari's visit, Kraft told ABC News Chicago they have "no plans to change the recipe for the original mac and cheese," and "...the safety and quality of our products is our highest priority and we take consumer concerns very seriously. We carefully follow the laws and regulations in the countries where our products are sold." Hari replied, "People have tried to petition the FDA over and over and it hasn't worked. The best way to create change is to hold the food companies responsible." While the dyes are legal in the U.S., Kraft uses a different formula in the United Kingdom without artificial dyes. By the end of October 2013 the petition had received about 348,000 signatures. In October 2013, Kraft announced they would change the ingredients in three of its Mac & Cheese products aimed at children, which included the use of whole grains, reduction in salt and some fats, and changing the coloring; Kraft said that the changes were not a response to the petition but rather were part of an ongoing effort to improve the nutrition of the offerings, which takes several years to plan and implement. Hari claimed credit for the changes. In April 2015, Kraft further announced that they will remove artificial dyes and artificial preservatives from all of its Mac & Cheese products by 2016. In 2013, Hari wrote about the use of class IV caramel color in Newcastle Brown Ale on her blog and put public pressure on them to drop this ingredient. In January 2015, Heineken announced that they would stop adding class IV caramel color to their Newcastle Brown Ale, and would instead color it naturally with the same roasted malt they had previously used. Heineken's announcement came just prior to the release of her book, The Food Babe Way (February 10, 2015), that devotes a chapter to the ingredients—including caramel coloring—in some beers, wines, and liquors. In February 2014, Hari launched a petition on her website asking Subway to remove azodicarbonamide (an FDA-approved flour bleaching agent and dough conditioner) from their sandwich bread. The petition gathered more than 50,000 signatures in 24 hours. Subway later announced a plan to remove the ingredient from all of their sandwich breads, a process which began before her campaign. The Center For Science In The Public Interest, who advocates for its reduction, credited Hari for drawing attention to it. The Environmental Working Group supported the removal of azodicarbonamide and urged against its use. Food science experts have pointed out that the level of azodicarbonamide permitted by the FDA for use in bread is too low to pose a significant risk. In June 2014, Hari posted a petition asking major brewers to list the ingredients in their products, something which U.S. brewers are not required to do. As part of this campaign, she claimed that commercial .... Discover the Vani Hari popular books. Find the top 100 most popular Vani Hari books.