“Smart” food labels puzzle nutritionists
The New York Times
A new food-labeling campaign called Smart Choices, backed by most of the nation’s largest food manufacturers, is “designed to help shoppers easily identify smarter food and beverage choices” but also recommends sugar-laden cereals such as Cocoa Krispies and Froot Loops. The green checkmark label that is starting to show up on store shelves will appear on hundreds of packages, including some choices that are surprising many nutritionists. “These are horrible choices,” said Walter C. Willett, chairman of the nutrition department of the Harvard School of Public Health. He said the criteria used by the Smart Choices Program were seriously flawed, allowing less healthy products, like sweet cereals and heavily salted packaged meals, to win its seal of approval. “It’s a blatant failure of this system, and it makes it, I’m afraid, not credible,” he said. The Food and Drug Administration and the Department of Agriculture also have weighed in, sending the program’s managers a letter Aug. 19 saying they intended to monitor its effect on food choices. The letter said agencies would be concerned if the labeling “had the effect of encouraging consumers to choose highly processed foods and refined grains instead of fruits, vegetables and whole grains.” The government is interested in improving nutrition labeling on packages in part because of the nation’s obesity epidemic. Eileen Kennedy, president of the Smart Choices board and the dean of the Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy at Tufts University, said the program’s criteria were based on government dietary guidelines and widely accepted nutritional standards. She said the program also was influenced by research into consumer behavior. That research showed that while shoppers wanted more information, they did not want to hear negative messages or feel as though they were being dictated to. “The checkmark means the food item is a ‘better for you’ product, as opposed to having an x on it saying ‘Don’t eat this,’ ” Kennedy said. Kennedy, who is not paid for her work on the program, defended the products endorsed by the program. Froot Loops qualifies for the label because it meets standards set by the Smart Choices Program for fiber and Vitamins A and C, and because it does not exceed limits on fat, sodium and sugar. It contains the maximum amount of sugar allowed under the program for cereals, 12 grams per serving, which in the case of Froot Loops is 41 percent of the product, measured by weight. Ten companies have signed up for the Smart Choices Program so far, including Kellogg’s, Kraft Foods, ConAgra Foods, Unilever, General Mills, PepsiCo and Tyson Foods. Companies that participate pay up to $100,000 a year to the program, with the fee based on total sales of its products that bear the seal.