Marketing ‘Nutritious’ Foods Through Packaging
It appears that people are becoming more conscious of their food choices. To further this understanding, it’s important for food producers to provide accurate and informative labels. However, most food companies view packaging as a final opportunity for marketing rather than providing useful information to consumers. Some advocates have even suggested that food packaging can actually decrease food literacy.
Food labeling has become important enough that even the United Nations’ World Health Organization supports providing “accurate, standardized and comprehensible information on the content of food items” on packaging and/or labels. While most countries require standard nutrition information on packaging, Front-Of-Package (FOP) labeling is often unregulated or under-regulated. In Canada, for example, there aren’t any specific regulations governing the use of FOP labels other than demanding the not be “false, misleading, or deceptive.” How these regulations are enforced is another matter.
In this study, researchers hypothesized that products with different FOP symbols would have a similar nutritional profile to products without FOP symbols. They collected data in 2010/2011, including 10,487 unique products from a selection of grocery retailers that account for about 56% of grocery sales in Canada. They found that 18% of products had some kind of FOP symbol(s). However, these symbols were not being used to market products that were nutritionally superior. Instead, the results suggest that FOP symbols are being used “more as a marketing feature in the interest of selling products than promoting healthier food choices.”
This study complements evidence generated by other research about the accuracy of food labels, including on animal products. The researchers suggest that regulators should establish minimum standards for products to carry FOP symbols, as a way to steer “nutrition marketing” in a more honest direction. Providing more informative and standardized symbols for both nutrition and animal welfare could be an important step in persuading more consumers to choose plant-based alternatives.