Food Retailers Need To Prove Commitment To Health, Says British Heart Foundation

Main Category: Nutrition / Diet
Article Date: 07 Jun 2009 - 0:00 PDT

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In response to the report 'A Commitment to Health' published by the British Retail Consortium Alex Callaghan, Policy Officer at the British Heart Foundation (BHF) said:

"Whilst food retailers have made some efforts to help consumers make healthy choices, on the key issue of food labelling, they are still resisting change.

"If retailers want to prove their commitment to people's health they should bring in food labelling model which combines traffic light colours, GDAs and the words high, medium and low.

"This is the system that consumers say gives them the clearest and simplest information about the food they buy. It was the recommendation of the recent independent evaluation (2) and the Department of Health has stated publicly that industry should adopt it. (3)

"It's time for food companies to stop making excuses, and ensure shoppers are given the 'at a glance' information they need."

(1) Issued in response to "British Retailing: A commitment to health" published by the British Retail Consortium.

(2) Comprehension and use of UK nutrition signpost labelling schemes, authored by Nutrition Signposting Evaluation Project Management Panel

(3) Department of Health - Healthy Weight, Healthy Lives obesity strategy

Source
The British Heart Foundation