Founder and Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Bombay Shaving Company, Shantanu Deshpande has raised concerns over growing addiction of quick food delivery in India and called it a health epidemic in making.
In a LinkedIn post, Shantanu Deshpande said, “We are suffering from the biggest epidemic of poor nutrition and unhealthy processed and ultra processed food which is high on palm oil and sugar. Our grains have lost nutrition over last 50 years as we prioritized agricultural yield for nutrition.” He criticised the reliance on processed and ultra-processed meals and also addiction to junk food.
In the post, Shantanu Deshpande cited a conversation with a founder of a quick commerce for food firm and expressed his shock at the amount of time it takes in cooking and delivering the food order. “Cook time 2 min, delivery time 8 min. A ‘qcom for food’ founder told me this and I lost my mind,” he said.
Besides, he also talked about how this approach is steering India to become another US and China without enough economic backing. “Our junk food addiction, fuelled by 49 rs pizzas and 20 rs poison energy drinks and 30 rs burgers, is taking us down the path of China and US without the economic cover needed for health,” he said.
He called on quick commerce firms including Zomato and Swiggy and Zepto cautioning them about the issue and requested them to make sure the food is ‘platable’.
He continued in his post, “And all the investors and founders are already finding fancy words for this to bake it into the next big wave of Indian commerce. Zomato and Swiggy and Zepto – please, dont. And if you are so keen, please make the product palatable.”