Talk:Vegemite

Is this manufactured in Australia, NZ or both?

Two of the photos in the article show a jar of vegemite with an "NZ Made" kiwi logo. This is odd, as I always thought vegemite was only manufactured in Australia. I checked out Kraft's website, but it doesn't say where the stuff is made.

Can anyone clarify this? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 58.143.59.28 (talk) 12:07, 11 February 2009 (UTC)

Vegemite was made in NZ for many years. But recently (within the last few years) the Vegemite available in NZ has been Australian made. This was made evident by the reversion to glass rather than Plastic jars. 121.73.90.127 (talk) 06:06, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

I buy vegemite from different retailers in Canada and the glass jar sometimes says manufactured in Australia, sometimes NZ. 70.77.220.229 (talk) 17:13, 23 April 2011 (UTC)

See also: Natto ???

Why is Natto a link in the "See also" section of this article? That's like having Fried Rice in the "See also" section of the Marmalade article. -- Moondigger (talk) 21:06, 18 June 2009 (UTC)

I don't know the motivations of the person who made the addition, but I can offer an explanation: Natto is another food strongly associated with a particular country, with a very pungent savoury flavour, and regarded as a "rite of passage" for visitors to that country. 150.101.214.82 (talk) 08:57, 15 March 2010 (UTC)

American Spelling?! I don't think so.

This article contains a few American English spelling varients. Considering that Vegemite is such a fundamentally Australian product and icon, and in accordance with the Wikipedia Manner of Style regarding articles bearing strong national ties with English-speaking countries (See WP:ENGVAR), I am going change the American spellings to their far more adequate Australian English equivalents. Gilly of III (talk) 16:35, 4 October 2009 (UTC)

D'oh. I meant "Manual of Style", rather than "Manner of Style". Gilly of III (talk) 16:37, 4 October 2009 (UTC)

Hillary Clinton bit

I don't think that this is really notable as it was listed before, but it could be useful in a different context:

Secretary of State Hilary Clinton asked in 2010 during an appearance at Melbourne University why you would ruin a perfectly good slice of bread with Vegemite? [1][2]

I considered it worth "storing" on the talk page for potential future use after it was removed from the article. SchuminWeb (Talk) 17:00, 9 January 2011 (UTC)

Banned from sale in Denmark?

Food laws passed in 2004 concerning added vitamins may effectively prohibit the sale of Vegemite in Denmark [3]. There seems to be some uncertainty about the exact position at the moment, though, so I don't suppose it could be added to the article yet [4] Ka Faraq Gatri (talk) 18:47, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

High Salt Content and Debate over relevence of this for Children's daily consumption

AussiLegend, I (and possibly others) do not understand what your issue is with the following statement and why you repeatedly undo it?

In recent years independent or governmental nutritionists have been raising parental/public awareness of Vegemite's salt content (7.5% for classic) to encourage balanced consumption in children.
While the very high salt content is not debated the relevence of this for children is.

Originally you rejected the first sentence because it had no citation. When a typical citation (there are many) was provided it was still removed.
(http://www.smh.com.au/national/new-vegemite-raises-ire-of-health-experts-20110216-1awo1.html)

I presume your grounds are technical, but it is not clear what you really object to?

Do you believe Vegemite is not one of the ten most salty foods available in the supermarket?
(Actually I was not trying to prove this. Nobody seems to debate that - just as nobody debates Vegemite is one of the world's richest source's of vitamin B.
Incidentally that vitamin B claim is not cited/supported in the Vegemite article either - but nobody has an issue with that. So I don't think this is your technical issue?)

Do you believe I have not shown by my citation that there is a robust debate going on out there on the relevence of the above fact wrt children's daily safe salt intake? If this is the reason, what sort of acceptable citation do I need to provide to evidence such a debate between Governmental/Independent health bodies and the yeast spreads industry/lovers?

Because there is a debate then any citation proving this ... is sort of necessarily going to be look like WP:SYNTH isn't it?
In which case shouldn't this be acceptable - and which observation itself confirms the existence of such a lively debate?

Would appreciate your clarification of this matter.

BTW I am a Vegemite lover myself. But I believe in balanced exposition of raw nutritional facts, the bad-looking as well as the good-looking.
This gives more power to the people who should decide for themselves how this raw information is relevent, or to be interpretted, wrt their children's actual likely daily consumption amounts. Blue Horizen (talk) 23:47, 7 September 2011 (UTC)

Citations must directly support the claims being made and the source that you used did not support most of what I removed. What was supported made no sense when the unsupported content was removed and it wasn't actually attributed to the source in any case. --AussieLegend (talk) 10:31, 8 September 2011 (UTC)

Dear AussiLegend,
appreciate your response but you haven't really said anything more clarificatory that the brief comments you made in the edit section.
Its all very technical and general and doesn't deal to the very particular questions I am asking of you here. We aren't really connecting here.

It would be great if you could humour me and other readers who want to improve the balance of the Nutritional section of the Vegemite article.
You could do that by taking more time to collaborate with us by explicitly explaining your somewhat cursory/technical/generalised admin response wrt to actual content and detailed questions I have raised above.

I don't think such a cursory approach on a Talk page well serves the collaborative spirit of what Wikipedia is about. Thanks, Blue Horizen (talk) 22:51, 8 September 2011 (UTC)

As I indicated above, citations must directly support the claims being made. My response was not cursory. The problems with the content, and the source used, with regard to this are so blindingly obvious that I didn't see any need to elaborate, as all one needs do is read the content and the source. However, since you're obviously having problems with it, I'll provide you with specifics:

• "In recent years" - Not mentioned in the source
• "independent or governmental nutritionists have been raising parental/public awareness of Vegemite's salt content" - not mentioned in the source, which simply criticises the salt content of the new formula Vegemite.
• "7.5% for classic" - Not mentioned in the source which only supports a sodium content of 1,720mg/100g (1.72%). The source says that the new formula "has half the sodium used in the original Vegemite recipe", so even if you equated the sodium (Na) to salt (NaCl), this means the content of "classic" Vegemite is only 3.44%. The sodium content of Veemite is actually 3.45%.[5]
• "to encourage balanced consumption in children" - Not stated in the article. The article just says that the salt content is too high. Equating this to "balanced consumption" is WP:SYNTH.
• "While the very high salt content is not debated the relevence of this for children is." - This claim isn't attributed to the source (it was placed after it) but is partially contradicted by the source, especially the final sentence: "She said the trouble with introducing salty foods in children's diets was that they developed a taste for salt that tended to carry through to adulthood." --AussieLegend (talk) 07:29, 9 September 2011 (UTC)

Dear Aussilegend
I now have a better handle on where you are coming from thanks.

Perhaps you are overthinking my contribution. I am only making three simple points:
(1) The salt content of Vegemite is 7.5% by weight.
(2) Credible health professionals are concerned about this very high concentration especially wrt consumption by children. Increasingly they are making their concerns known through direct public statements.
(3) Opponents debate the relevence of this very high %. (They say actual daily consumption is likely low enough to be of no concern).

You seem to have two major issues with the above three facts:
(a) You demand that all three facts be supported by explicit citations and that I have not done so adequately.
(b) You outrightly deny the factual truth of the 7.5%.

Lets take (b) first as it is most easily dealt to:
In your above analysis (which I mostly agree with) you have actually proven what you set out to deny. Let me explain the final mistake made.

If sodium (Na) content (you say 3.44%) is equated to salt content (NaCl) then, by the rules of high school chemistry, that must be 3.44 x (58.5/23) = 8.75% (those calc numbers are the atomic weights of salt and chlorine).
This concurrs with independent Vegemite nutritional info easily found on the Net which ranges from 7.5-9%.
(Call me a liar for saying 7.5% - I erred on the side of caution in the interests of NPOV).

Now lets deal to (a):
Wiki editing principles state, “Wiki Verifiability...requires inline citations for any material challenged or likely to be challenged, and for all quotations”
By demanding a citation you are explicitly challenging the veracity of these three facts.

Yet examples/sources wrt these three facts are readily found on the Net with a minimum of homework.
Have you actually searched the Net to discover for yourself what that % is? Your attempt to use my own citation against me has ended up supporting my facts.
Noone, that I can find, credibly denies these statements. Can you provide reliable sources for us that bring any of my three facts into question?
If you cannot then your challenge does seem to come across as an unnecessary and trivial filibuster.

The other area I am concerned about is what looks like selective editing:
“Vegemite is one of the world's richest known sources of B vitamins...” is allowed to stand uncited and unsupported.
However “In recent years Nutritionists have been raising parental awareness of Vegemite's salt content (7.5%)” was immediately challenged.
This selective bias is not a good look re Wiki NPOV (neutral point of view) principles.

Conclusion:
Therefore it does now seem time to let this go and allow my contribution to stand (even without citation).
I propose the following revised contribution:

“Vegemite’s high salt content (7.5% for classic) is of increasing concern to Nutrition professionals especially wrt consumption by children.
Opponents point out that children’s actual daily consumption is likely to be small and therefore this concentration is of no consequence.”

Good discussion thanks.
Blue Horizen (talk) 05:38, 12 September 2011 (UTC)