Food firms should be forced to reveal how healthy or unhealthy their products are, to help people consume a better diet, an industry boss has said. Ministers should compel companies to publish an annual report so consumers can see how much of their sales is made up of dishes that contain too much fat, salt and sugar, Stéfan Descheemaeker also said. Descheemaeker is the chief executive of Nomad Foods, which owns popular brands such as Birds Eye fish fingers, Findus frozen foods and Goodfella’s pizzas.
If you're the CEO, can't you do this without government compulsion, then, Stefan?
He told the Guardian that mandatory publication of what proportion of each firm’s sales count as healthy or unhealthy under government guidelines would kickstart a “nutrition arms race” in which manufacturers would vie with each other to make their products better for health.
Ah, I suspect he thinks this is a game he could win, and he wants competitors to be forced to enter.
His comments underline what one diet campaigner called the “quiet revolution” going on in the industry in its views on how best to tackle the UK’s addiction to unhealthy food. More and more manufacturers want the government to now order the sector to improve its behaviour, rather than relying on voluntary agreements as the Conservatives did during their 14 years in power.
So why don't they do it without government compulsion? I really cannot understand modern business leaders...
For the last seven years Nomad has published figures showing the percentage of its net sales that are deemed healthy under the government’s nutrient profiling model of judging which products contain the right or wrong amounts of fat, salt and sugar. It was now at 93.3% overall healthy, he said, according to the official high in fat, sugar or salt (HFSS) assessment system. Public disclosure of food firms’ sales would enable the creation of league tables that would allow those whose products are more often unhealthy to be named and shamed, backers say.
See? Stefan thinks the gold medal will be his! Is that why he wants government compulsion?
Tesco, Sainsbury’s, Iceland and the yoghurt maker Danone have already made clear they back mandatory reporting.
*baffled face* If they thought it was a winner with the shopping public, they'd do it, wouldn't they?
JH: I’m dropping this here from D’hamer, who seems to be having bother commenting:
ReplyDelete“ I have had a wee ” problem” stopping me adding the following comment to Julia’s post over on OOL and I can not be added repeatedly euphemising it to find out what the ” wee problem” is. Here goes.
That would mean that some government eedjit would decide what was “good” fat and sugar. No doubt with the guidance of a neutral industry. Aye, right.
Just like they take the advice of the trusted pharmaceutical companies, and the trusted passenger aircraft manufacturing companies.
In a few years we have gone from animal fat, including butter, eggs, etc. bad, but carbohydrates good to a complete about turn.
Oil seed rape oil, completely altered, has sneaked in everywhere, sometimes given a fancy name.
Dubious “approved sweeteners” are healthier than honey. Eh?
Just enforce the correct use of the existing ingredients list regulations. And publish the risks, even if none, of those E numbers.”
I'm betting that foods high in insect content will be judged to be the healthiest.
ReplyDeleteAlso,
As the saying goes, the devil makes work for idle hands. Perhaps these company CEOs haven't got enough proper work to do.
And
Isn't it the job of companies to provide their customers with goods that they want rather than telling them what they should have?