Will Brexit Change the Face of Labelling Food Prod

The Government ’ s strategy to tackle childhood obesity has given rise to a potentially new standard for food labelling. Amid critici sm accusing the government of watering down the strategy, new ideas are coming forth. One such idea is to mandate food packaging to be labelled with pi ctures of the number of teaspoons of sugar or salt. The current standard of th e traffic light system ’ , inserts the meaning of a traffic light to show, at a glance, what a product is high or low in. R ed is for foods containing a high level of ingredients, such as fat, sugars, and salt. Amber means a medium level, while green stands for a low level of potentially harmful ingredien ts, making it the healthiest choice. This system is thought to be confusing and difficult for the consumer to understand. There are some who would like to build on t his system by including or replacing it with a visual using teas poons. "We want to build on the success of our current labelling scheme, and review a dditional opportunities to go further and ensure we are using the most effect ive ways to communicate information to families , officials have stated. Under the new plans consumers would simply see images of teaspoons on pack aging to denote how healthy or unhealthy a product is. All of this is dependent on Brexit. Current European Union (EU) rules on trade do not allow for new labelling designs and techniques. By leavin g the EU, the Department of Health has stated that the government will be abl e to develop and enforce new standards, including the idea of adding pictu res of teaspoons of sugar, for food labelling. : The UK ’ s decision to leave the European Union will give us greater flexibility to determine what information should be presente d on packaged food, and how it should be displayed , officials have written in regards to the obesity strategy. Brexit gives us a chance to think about how we can better inform peo ple about sugar or salt content , said one Whitehall source. Forcing the food producers to the teaspoons system through new laws is what the Government is hoping for. Incentives to reduce the amount of harmful ingredients in food an d drink products are also being discussed. Regardless of what strategy i s used an d what label format is made standard, it is obvious that obesity a nd other health concerns must be addressed. A teaspoon of sugar may no l onger help the medicine go down. After all, the medicine will, hopefully , show just how much sugar it already contains . Maximum Daily Intake, at a glance: Salt: 6g for adults Sugar: 30g for adults, 19g for 4-6-year-olds, 24g for 7- 10 -year-olds Saturated fat: 30g for men, 20g for women