Traffic Light Food Labels and Obesity

Here is an outline of the relative merits of Traffic Light food labels and the food industry's alternative, the Percentage Daily Intake Counter. It was written to support a letter in the Medical Journal of Australia published on 1 January 2007.

AUSTRALIA'S WAR ON CHILDHOOD OBESITY
Before the war on obesity can even begin, there is a battle about food labels between:
• everybody who wants to prevent obesity;
• people with a financial interest in the food industry.

Nutrition experts want to tell people what they are eating—to show at a glance when a food is too fatty for the war on obesity—but the food industry is aware that people who can see a food is too fatty may not buy it.

WHAT THE EXPERTS SAY
Nutrition is complex, but food labels need to be simple. The essentials are the four nutrients where the Australian Dietary guidelines call for moderation—fat, saturated fat, sugar and salt.

Two supermarket chains in the UK use the British government's Traffic Light labels, and they already find that Traffic Lights change shopping behaviour—exactly what Australia needs in the war on obesity. With the fat content of a food an expert committee would reach a consensus on the boundaries for:
    green—low in fat
    amber—enough fat to require moderation
    red—too fatty to prevent obesity

THE FOOD INDUSTRY FIGHTS BACK
The food industry objects very strongly to Traffic Light food labels. The industry's complaint is that they are simplistic—a justification for point-blank refusal?—and that four lights (for fat, saturated fat, sugar and salt) would confuse people if (for example) two were red and two were green. But the message is simple— red lights increase the risk of preventable diseases, and the more red lights the greater the risk.

The industry is lobbying heavily for its alternative, the % DI (Percentage Daily Intake) Counter, which tells shoppers a lot more but without telling anybody what they need to know.

Instead of four lights, it shows 8 percentages of daily intake (the four requiring moderation plus 4 others, and optional additions such as vitamins and minerals). It replaces salt with the less widely understood sodium and recommends moderation with an asterisk against fat, saturated fat, sugar and sodium that is too small for many people to notice it. It never says what percentage would meet the need for moderation.

That is the whole point—the % DI Counter leaves shoppers to judge for themselves what all those percentages mean, with no hint on whether the experts might regard any of them as low, moderate or excessive. For political reasons the food industry's powerful lobby often wins and health often loses [1].

1. Nestlé M. Food politics: how the food industry influences nutrition and health. Berkeley, California: University of California Press; 2002.