Food companies should be required to reveal how healthy or unhealthy their products are to help people eat better, industry executives said.
Stefan Deschemaker also said the minister would force companies to publish annual reports so consumers could see how much of their sales were made up of dishes high in fat, salt and sugar. said it should.
Mr. Deschemaker is the chief executive officer of Nomad Foods, which owns popular brands such as Bird’s Eye Fishfingers, Findus Frozen Foods and Goodfellas Pizza.
He told the Guardian that if companies were required to publish what percentage of their sales are considered healthy or unhealthy under government guidelines, manufacturers would be forced to work together to make healthier products. He said a competitive “nutritional arms race” would begin.
He also called on Health Secretary Wes Streeting to put traffic light-style labels on all cans and packs of food. This will also help tackle the obesity crisis, as people will choose more nutritious foods and avoid unhealthy options, he said.
And he backed growing calls for new taxes on products containing excessive amounts of salt and sugar, backed by the House of Lords and the Labor-friendly think tank the Public Policy Institute.
His comments highlighted what one diet activist called a “quiet revolution” taking place in the industry in its view of how best to deal with Britain’s addiction to unhealthy food. are. A growing number of manufacturers are calling on the government to order the industry to improve its behavior, rather than relying on voluntary agreements during the 14 years the Conservatives were in power.
“We support measures that require companies to publish data. Requiring all food companies to do so will foster a nutrition arms race, spur an industry-wide reformulation movement, and ultimately We believe that this will increase the production, sale and consumption of delicious and healthy food,” De Schoemaker said in an interview.
Stefan Deschemaker from Nomad Foods head office in Woking. Photo: Laura Rose Wiatt/Guardian
For the past seven years, Nomad has shown the percentage of net sales considered healthy based on the government’s nutritional profiling model, which determines which products contain what amounts of fat, salt and sugar. They have published numbers. He said the overall health status was 93.3 per cent, according to the official High Fat, Sugar and Salt (HFSS) rating system.
Supporters say disclosing food companies’ sales numbers could create a league table that would name and shame companies with the most unhealthy products.
Tesco, Sainsbury’s, Iceland and yogurt maker Danone have already made it clear they support reporting requirements. The last government introduced the Food Data Transparency Partnership with industry, with the aim of bringing details of companies’ sales into the public domain. Although it was considered binding, it became a purely voluntary measure following industry protests.
“We believe that requiring front-of-pack nutrition labeling can play an important role in helping the public understand what is healthy and what is not,” Deshemakar said. said. “This effect is also seen in other European markets, such as France, where ‘nutrition scores’ have been shown to influence healthier purchasing decisions.”
Some supermarkets and retailers in the UK use color-coded labels on some or all products to warn consumers whether they are healthy or unhealthy, but this system is voluntary.
Both measures would encourage food manufacturers to reformulate their products by reducing the amount of fat, salt and sugar in them, Deschemaker said. He added that doing so is easier than some companies claim. He explains how, since acquiring the Goodfellas brand in 2018, Nomad has overhauled the nutritional profile of its pizzas by removing fat, salt and calories and adding more fiber. Listed how it now complies with HFSS regulations as a healthy product.
Nomad also reduced the amount of sugar in Aunt Bessie’s Apple Crumble by 30% and added 15% more dietary fiber, which also counts as HFSS compliant. Starting in 2020, the company also reduced the sodium content of some of its products, such as Birdseye Fish Fingers (21%) and Potato Waffles (28%), for the same reason.
He said the scale of the UK’s obesity crisis is so large, and the role of bad eating habits in causing major diseases such as obesity and cancer, so huge that the food industry as a whole must do more to improve public health. He said it was necessary to show “responsibility”.
James Toope, chief executive of chef Jamie Oliver’s weight-loss campaign Bite Back, said mandatory data transparency would prevent most major food companies from using their profits to sell unhealthy products. He said the dependence situation would change.
“Our research this year found that the UK’s biggest food manufacturers made most of their profits from selling unhealthy products. “It is heartening to see people now publicly supporting the government’s bold actions to make a difference,” he said.
“This quiet revolution taking place in the UK food industry is something we should all take advantage of, recognizing the role of businesses in reducing the amount of junk that is packaged as food and working towards healthier products. Many of these leaders have now made it clear that they want government policies that create a level playing field based on regulations, not just voluntary changes, so that everyone is held to the same high standards. can be maintained.
“It is important that measures such as healthier sales reporting requirements and front-of-pack traffic light labels are put in place to hold companies accountable for offering healthier food alternatives.”
Last week, the House of Lords Committee on Food, Diet, Nutrition and Obesity urged ministers to take a stronger approach to the food industry to tackle the “public health emergency” of obesity.
The report called for regular reporting of sales data, a new salt and sugar tax model modeled after the sugar tax, and “a decisive shift from voluntary action to a system of mandatory regulation for the food industry.”
Earlier this year, Mr Streeting warned food companies that a Labor government would use the “steamroller” to force them to reformulate their products, but since taking over as health secretary in July he has yet to do so. No action has been taken to pursue this. He is understood to prefer reform to the system rather than imposing taxes on products containing salt and sugar, given the cost of living crisis.
A Department of Health and Social Care spokesperson said: “We are tackling the obesity crisis head-on and shifting the focus from treatment to prevention to reduce the burden on the NHS and help people live healthier lives. “We are taking various measures,” he said. Longer.
“We are taking corresponding measures, including restricting junk food advertising on TV and online, empowering Congress to block the development of new fast food restaurants outside of schools, and banning the sale of energy drinks to under-16s. We are teaching.
“Our 10-year health plan will also transform the NHS by shifting the focus from disease to prevention.”
