Food labelling
Find out why traffic light labels help make healthy choices
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You may have noticed that some food products
have labels on the front of their packs which give information on
calories, sugar, fat, saturated fat, and salt.
However, because different food
retailers and manufacturers are using different types of food labels, comparing products can still be
tricky.
In surveys, shoppers have said that
they find the best labelling schemes include:
- Guidelines
daily amounts – the percentage of your daily calorie allowance that
the product provides.
- The words
high, medium and low.
- Traffic
light colours - red for high, amber for medium and green for
low.
These labels allow shoppers to see
how healthy a product is at a glance. But not all food retailers
and products provide this useful information. Some only list
guideline daily amounts, while others don’t have any front of
pack labelling at all.
Laws on food labelling can only be
decided at the European level. So we're calling on the UK
government to press for mandatory front-of-pack food labelling in
Europe - find out how you can support our
campaign for clearer labels.
Eating away from home
We often eat meals away from
home, such as in restaurants or the work
canteen. But nutritional information is often not available on
menus, making it difficult to tell which are the
healthy options. This is especially important for people who
are trying to avoid high levels of fat or salt, such as those of us
with heart disease.
Some restaurants are currently
testing calorie labelling. This is a good step in the
right direction and in the future we would like to see this in
a wider range of outlets, with additional information on fat,
saturated fat, sugar and salt.
For further information
please read our position statements on food
labelling or
food outside the home, or email us at policy@bhf.org.uk.