Are Food Standards Agency (FSA) ignoring their own evidence regarding front of pack labelling?
Last Friday a Food Standards Agency (FSA) Board paper recommended that traffic light labelling should only be optional. Has the food industry secured a victory in their battle against clear food labelling?
The FSA’s own evidence shows that using traffic light colours on food labels to indicate whether a product is high or low in fat, sugar and salt, is the most helpful way to show what are healthy food choices.
Research shows that parents are among those most likely to use this type of label, and people have reported that traffic light labels are a useful way of teaching children how to choose healthy foods. Have FSA ignoring this evidence in an attempt to pacify the food industry?
The FSA recommendations have to be approved by FSA’s Board before going to the Government. The Board meet in Cardiff this Wednesday (10th March), so please email them now, making the following points:
• The paper published by the Food Standards Agency (FSA) on Friday (5th March) was disappointing as it will let food companies off the hook in providing consistent and easily understood front of pack nutritional labelling.
• The paper ignores FSA’s own evidence: the independent evaluation of front-of-pack signpost labelling commissioned by FSA found that traffic light colours were a key part of the best understood label, and that having different labelling schemes was confusing to consumers.
• The FSA Board should reject the recommendations and stick by its own evidence in favour of a single scheme which incorporates traffic light colours as a necessary, not optional, part.
You can email Lord Rooker, FSA Chair, c/o
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