Originally published December 3 2005
Scotland food agency may use new labeling system to alert consumers about nutrition
by Mike Adams, the Health Ranger, NaturalNews Editor
In Scotland, the Food Standards Agency is considering the implementation of a "traffic-light" based labeling system that would alert consumers to the nutritional qualities of the food they eat, but the idea of red lighting unhealthy foods was not well-received among the food industry.
A "TRAFFIC-LIGHT" labelling system could be brought in to inform shoppers about the nutritional content of processed foods, the Food Standards Agency has said.
But the proposal to "red light" unhealthy foods was given a cool reception by the food industry.
Tesco issued a statement saying that customers found the proposed multiple traffic-light system "confusing" and that its current "signpost" scheme was better.
said it was "crunch time" for the food industry and called on it to stop developing numerous different schemes which it blamed for causing confusion among shoppers trying to eat a healthy diet.
Two labelling schemes were put forward for a 12-week consultation by the FSA.
The "multiple traffic-light" scheme uses red, amber and green to show high, medium and low levels of fat, saturated fat, sugar and salt.
The second combines colour coding with additional information about guideline daily allowances for the same four nutrients.
This option was the most popular with 2,600 consumers questioned by the FSA.
However, 31 per cent could not use it to interpret levels of fat, saturated fat, salt and sugar correctly when shown just one product.
The FSA, which can only recommend a voluntary scheme, said it was therefore "considering proposing" the multiple traffic-light labels for the front-of-pack scheme.
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