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To ‘save the planet from cows’ and people from obesity and cardiovascular disease, Amsterdam has turned food into the ‘new tobacco,’ banning the advertisement of meat. The result? No health benefits, but less choice, less evidence-based policies, and increasing pressure on traditional food systems and European SMEs.

What is happening?

Amsterdam bans the advertisement of meat in public spaces: billboards, transport shelters, and digital screens. Private media and retail outlets are excluded, but the political signal is clear.

This is nothing new in the Netherlands. The city is following a path already seen elsewhere, particularly in the United Kingdom, where there are restrictions on advertising HFSS foods and discussions about so-called ‘health targets’ for retailers. Formally, nothing is banned, but in practice, the market is being steered.

Amsterdam is the first European capital to directly target a specific food, after years in which states and regions had already targeted alcoholic beverages—including wine—and individual nutrients such as sugar.

Why it’s important

This confirms what I pointed out years ago: food is becoming the new tobacco. Not because of comparable health risks, but because of the political approach.

• First, food is culturally delegitimized.
• Then, communication is restricted.
• Finally, individual choices are ‘normalized.’

Policies presented as protecting health or the environment end up reducing citizens’ freedom and shifting decision-making power to the authorities.

Key concepts

ENVIRONMENT: METHANE IS NOT CO₂

The idea that meat is inherently incompatible with sustainability is debatable. Methane from livestock belongs to a short biological cycle, unlike fossil CO₂. Reducing a complex issue to a slogan generates bad policies, not solutions.

PUBLIC HEALTH: BALANCE, NOT BANS

Meat provides essential nutrients that are difficult to replace with other sources. Health is built through balanced diets and conscious lifestyles, not by discouraging individual foods. The problem is excessive consumption, not consumption itself.

INNOVATION YES, DISCRIMINATION NO

The Netherlands can innovate and invest in alternative proteins, but it should not discriminate against other foods for ideological or symbolic reasons.

Science, simplifications, ideology

Complex phenomena such as obesity and cardiovascular disease are reduced to nutrients or scores. This simplification facilitates regulation but remains distant from real behaviors and evidence. Sugar taxes are one example: marginal benefits and high economic costs.

The precedent

The issue is not meat, but the precedent. When authorities decide what can appear in public spaces, the scope easily expands: other foods, other sectors, other choices, with concrete costs for traditional supply chains and SMEs.

Europe: what happens now?

This approach is spreading across Europe and could be consolidated with the Safe Hearts Plan. The risk is a new wave of bans that do not address the real causes of health challenges, linked to the complexity of lifestyles.

When food becomes the new tobacco, it is not just about diet: it is about freedom, the model of society we choose, and trust in citizens.

Read Pietro Paganini’s comment in Italian on EFA News>>>