How Americans Are Tricked Into Buying Fake Food

The food in your kitchen cabinets may not be what it seems. Fraudsters motivated by economic gain secretly infiltrate the global food market through a variety of means, including counterfeits, dilutions, substitution and mislabeling, according to the Global Food Safety Initiative. This may not only harm consumers’ wallets, but it can also put public health and safety at risk. Some estimates say food fraud affects at least 1% of the global food industry at a cost as high as $40 billion a year, according to the FDA.

Produced by: Andrea Miller
Graphics by: Christina Locopo, Alex Wood
Additional Camera: Charlotte Morabito
Supervising Producer: Lindsey Jacobson

About CNBC: From 'Wall Street' to 'Main Street' to award winning original documentaries and Reality TV series, CNBC has you covered. Experience special sneak peeks of your favorite shows, exclusive video and more.

Connect with CNBC News Online

#CNBC

How Americans Are Tricked Into Buying Fake Food

[jennagle]

Companies need to be held accountable. Not by being fined, but by being pulled from the market.

[contextmatters]

This is what happens when you live in a society where the elites are not held accountable...

[brianh]

The penalties for this sort of crime should be a lot higher than they are currently. Sometimes companies are just being fined. I guarantee that if company management thought they would go to jail for food fraud they would think twice about doing it.

[dzinypinydoroviny]

We Europeans often rant about how strict EU regulations of food labelling are but seeing this makes me really grateful for them.

[reem]

This is what happens when your government is filled with people who care more about corporations turning a profit than protecting citizens.

[n_hr]

Someone’s Life isn’t a joke.. these people should lose their licenses and put behind bars for risking innocent people’s lives..

[ChristysChannelYall]

I’m a 51 year old American and I know that as I’ve gotten older it seems the food has gotten worse. I never had any problems with my gut when I was younger, but now I have gut issues very frequently. And I’m an active healthy person with no illnesses, not overweight, no issues. It’s disgusting what they are allowed to get away with here.

[thebabaa]

Being an elderly person, my life has passed through the 50's into the many decades that have followed.
50's -
Any, every grocery store contained produce that smelled..
Potatoes, lettuce, beans had aroma that hit you in the face the minute you opened the door .
That 'scent' is completely gone.
Even in open outdoor markets where the items might even have been picked that very day.!!
Then, the explosion of 'products occured. Products and not food.

Into the 80's the Taste started disappearing. Foods that I purchased over and over suddenly lost their flavors..

Now, we know that food manufacturers are being geared into openly admitting their 'products' are completely 'man-factured' as a 'Product', instead of actually being a food for human consumption..

[MrBeatboxmasta]

The penalties for food fraud should be high enough to bankrupt companies on the first offense. I bet they would magically find a way to be transparent. Food fraud is rampant because it's worth it.

[MrBetaRayBill]

It saddens me that the FDA does such a poor job at protecting our food supply. If this was treated as an attack on Americans (which it is), it would go a long way in preventing this fraud. We pay too much money for food, too not know what’s in it.

[terrelldrayton]

It annoys me they won’t expose the companies doing this. The news is always trying to scare us. All this reporting yet they hold no one accountable 😂

[FitnessYouTube-ghjt]

*Media:* Fast Food is unhealthy.
*Me:* Okay I'll eat healthy food outside.
*Media:* All outside food is unhealthy.
*Me:* Okay, I'll cook at home and eat.
*Media:* Food you buy at the store can have unhealthy ingredients.
*Me:* Cool, I'll cook organic, whole foods at home only.
*Media:* Expensive healthy food bought at the store is fraudulent.

*Me:* I ... guess I'll just grow a farm?

[BJustChillin]

More needs to be done about this. Hold company’s and individuals accountable. Jail time and extremely high fines are in order.

[petef.]

I used to work in a food production factory here in the US, and we were inspected by the FDA annually. There were two things I always found surprising. #1: I feel like the inspection done by the FDA is not thorough enough, meaning that things swept under the rug by management could easily be overlooked. #2: The hourly employees in my plant, especially those with extensive tenure, saw all the bull$hit that management pulled and corners that were cut. Yet when the FDA came in, there were things that got swept under the rug and the FDA inspectors missed things happening right under their noses. In addition, management followed the inspector around the facility everywhere they went, to make sure us hourly employees remained silent. When an FDA inspector did ask an hourly employee questions, management was right there ready to give us a stern look if we were about to say anything that stepped out of line, even if it was the truth. You can bet your @ss that future employment and promotions within the company were automatically off the table if you spoke up. It makes me wonder if this happens in the place I worked at before, then it must be happening all over the country. We really DON'T know what's going on inside of our food production facilities, and we don't know exactly how our food is handled, or what exactly is put in it. Bottom line, I will never trust the FDA, and if I can't trust the FDA then I don't trust the government either.

[lavelleandrae]

Humanity suffers from a lack of integrity and an abundance of greed.

[VickiTakacs.]

No one is mentioning that we are forced to pay more for food that they do not add awful ingredients to. That is such a racket and crazy.

[dgpuped]

For people with food allergies, this could potentially be a very serious problem. Even at the best of times, you do not know where you may find an allergen.

[freedomfirst]

Wow, if only Americans had an agency that could protect them ….we could even call it the Food and drug administration, that’s a catchy name

[Ladybug]

Would have been helpful if more brands were named. For instance I've heard quite a lot about fake olive oil but people seem to be hesitant to name the brands.

[sabrinapittsley]

I just noticed a few months ago a NEW kind of labeling. “This product contains “bioengineered food ingredients “ on a lot of over processed foods.