The IGD has warned that government plans to shake up the UK’s metrics for defining unhealthy food will delay Wes Streeting’s plans for mandatory health reporting until 2030 or beyond.
The Grocer revealed last week that government ministers held urgent talks with food industry leaders to discuss fears over its shift to an updated 2018 nutrient profiling model.
Company bosses warned the government that its plans to use the new model, to replace the existing version dating back to 2004, would reclassify thousands of products as unhealthy despite many having spent millions on reformulation.
Under the government’s proposals, the new model, which includes much tougher restrictions on free sugars, would be used to underpin the HFSS junk food ban on television and online, as well as restrictions on junk food promotions in supermarkets.
After the talks, which included large food companies, trade bodies, NGOs and academics, IGD said it feared pushing ahead with the changes could derail Streeting’s plans to bring in mandatory reporting as part of his 10-year NHS plan.
“Following this roundtable, our wider engagement with technical experts and IGD’s Industry Forums, we are concerned that implementation of the current NPM 2018 will delay the introduction of mandatory reporting beyond the government’s 2029 deadline, specifically due to the inclusion of the free sugars metric,” said IGD head of health and sustainable diets Hannah Daley.
“This is because of the complexities of measuring consistently, accessing proprietary data and implementing the free sugar calculation at scale.”
The Grocer revealed last week that industry leaders were warning the moves would “pile more costs“ at a time of huge economic uncertainty and threaten to push up food prices.
IGD chief executive Sarah Bradbury added: “Obesity is a critical issue and we advocate for shifting the nation towards the latest government dietary guidelines at pace to improve health outcomes.
“NPM 2018 involves challenges presented by using free sugars, and we hosted a roundtable to explore how businesses could practically deliver the changes required to adopt it. Our next steps are to continue to interrogate if a solution for the free sugars calculation can be implemented consistently at scale, as well as exploring the potential of using total sugars within NPM 2018.
“The priority must be improving public health, which requires a pragmatic approach, to make it work and move at pace, without incurring unnecessary additional cost and food price inflation.”
Health campaign groups have accused the industry of attempting to water down the 10-year plan and urged the DHSC to push ahead with its planned consultation on the changes
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