National Obesity Awareness Week from 12 to 18 January
Marketing Week | Alison Millington | 12 Jan 2015
Anti-obesity groups call for sugar cuts as retailers take action
The National Obesity Forum is calling for mandatory regulations on fat, salt and sugar content in food and drink as retailers including Tesco and Asda make bids to cut calories and sugar from their products.
Tam Fry, a spokesman for the NOF, told Marketing Week: “The food industry is not doing enough. We have so much food with ingredients that are leading to obesity and other diseases and time is running out.”
Fry claims that obesity is costing the UK £47bn a year. In response, the NOF are pushing six recommendations, the main one being the reduction of sugar in food.
“There are high levels of sugar needlessly in food and it’s causing huge damage,” Fry said.
The NOF also believes the front-of-pack traffic light system should be mandatory, despite the fact that the EU recently objected to the use of the scheme, calling it “over simplistic”.
Meanwhile, the British Dietetic Association (BDA) has called for public policies that reduce the frequency and amount of sugary drinks consumed by children and adolescents.
It has also called for a tax on sugary drinks as well as education programmes in a move to reduce obesity. Article
