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Objective: To understand if, and how, Australian ultra-processed food industry actors use Twitter to influence food and health policy debates and produce a conceptual framework to describe such influence.Design: Twitter data of prominent industry actors were defined through purposive sampling and inductively coded to investigate possible influence on food and health policy debates. These are described using descriptive statistics and coded extracts.Setting: Australia.Participants: Twitter accounts of nine prominent ultra-processed food industry actors, including major trade associations.Results: Ultra-processed food industry actors actively used Twitter to influence food and health policy debates. Seven overarching strategies were identified: co-opting public health narratives; opposing regulation; supporting voluntary, co- or self-regulation; engaging policy processes and decision-makers; linking regulatory environments to the need for ongoing profitability; affecting public perceptions and value judgements; and using ignorance claims to distort policy narratives. Each lobbying strategy is underpinned with tactics described throughout and captured in a framework.Conclusions: The current study creates a framework to monitor how food industry actors can use social media to influence food and health policy debates. As such, social media appears to be not only an important commercial determinant of health for brand marketing, but also an extension of lobbying practices to reshape public perceptions of corporate conduct and policy-making. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation (REDD+) has emerged as a potentially important component of the global policy mix to mitigate climate change. Against a background of increasing engagement between private sector entities and conservation organizations, private sector investment has emerged in REDD+. Despite slow developments at the international scale, there continues to be private sector interest in REDD+ and continued voluntary investments in REDD+ projects and initiatives. In order to better understand possible models for private sector engagement in REDD+, this study analysed the motivation of private sector stakeholders to engage in REDD+, the perception of the potential of REDD+, the critical obstacles to making REDD+ functional and how actors perceive themselves as part of future REDD+ scenarios. Based on interviews and a workshop with private sector actors, this study found that few expect a regulatory market for REDD+ to emerge and that credits from the voluntary market have to be tailored to specific needs. As a carbon offset, REDD+ provides insufficient motivation for investment, particularly if cheaper alternatives exist. Co-benefits such as biodiversity conservation and community development are more important when traditional corporate social responsibility motivations play a role. Project scale remains important not only for the fact that smaller projects are viewed as offering more visible benefits to stakeholders but also as a means of having more control over risks on the ground, posing a challenge for the design of jurisdictional REDD+. Moving towards supply chains that are free from deforestation offers an opportunity to tackle commodity-driven deforestation. While questions remain about how such an approach might be integrated into REDD+, it could help address a perceived gap between private sector understanding of the values of REDD+ and the risks associated with these values not arising – termed here as a ‘missing middle’. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]