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IateApie.net provides reviews of food products
with diet & nutritional claims such as low fat, low carb, reduced sugar,
less sodium and whole grain.
While companies such as Coca-Cola, ConAgra Foods, General Mills, Kellogg Company, Kraft Foods, PepsiCo, Unilever and Wal-Mart will be featuring the new Smart Choices Food Label, Sara Lee North American Fresh Bakery has announced that easy-to-read call-out graphics with key nutrition information, Nutritional Spotlight, will appear on all of its bread, bun and bagel products beginning in January 2009 with its Soft & Smooth bread line [Source: Food Business Review]. SuperValu Supermarkets are also rolling out an in-store nutrition program called Nutrition iQ. Nutrition iQ uses established U.S. FDA nutrient content claims as a framework to determine the nutritional benefits of items that pass a set of qualifying criteria. Products meeting the threshold criteria are then further evaluated to identify their top one or two nutritional benefits, which are called out for consumers on color-coded nutrition iQ shelf tags. The nutrition iQ program will roll out across SuperValu's family of grocery stores nationwide, including Acme, Albertsons, Bigg's, Cub Foods, Farm Fresh, Hornbacher's, Jewel-Osco, Lucky, Shaw's/Star Market, Shop 'n Save, and Shoppers Food & Pharmacy, over the next six months. United Supermarket and Market Street, a Texas based grocery chain will also be debuting their in-house nutrition system at their newest store. Their Tag Labels are color coded to identify foods that are Gluten-Free, Heart Healthy, Diabetic friendly, Lean/ Low-Fat, Sugar-Free, Reduced Sugar and Organic. With all these different labeling systems for foods, will it be confusing to the consumer to figure out which foods are actually good for them? Or is this just a case of too much information that will lead to misinformation? I'm concerned that all these "self identified" healthy (or not healthy) foods are determined by different groups that may have their own agenda, and that this should be the exclusive territory of the FDA (or some other central group that has been appointed this task).  See more on: food labels
, Coca Cola, General Mills, Kelloggs, Kraft, PepsiCo, Sara Lee, SuperValu, Unilever, Wal-Mart
 comments (2)
Comments
Tue: January 20, 2009
brista said: By the way, if you are at all concerned about High Fructose Corn Syrup -- do not buy Sara Lee bread!! It's horrible, beceause it's more expensive and it does indeed look healthier than some of the other brands, but all of their bagel/bread products have HFCS. Now, I know the corn refiners association has been issuing a lot of commercials and press releases about how HFCS is a-okay. But even their advertisments add the stipulation of "...in moderation." Except HFCS is so many foods that unless you try to actively avoid it, you WILL be eating it. At my local grocery stores, there are at least a dozen brands of sliced bread, each with maybe three or four different "version" (white, wheat, etc.) Out of all of those, only ONE did not contain HFCS. It wasn't Sara Lee, despite Sara Lee's labels of 'healthy!!' 'wheat!!' 'grains!!!', etc. So I wouldn't take Sara Lee (or PepsiCo or Kraft or...) for its words. Always read the labels!! |
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brista said:
Hm, I don't know. On the one hand, I don't know if it would really HURT but I don't think it's really helpful. There are lots of labels now and many of them are (in my opinion!) being exploited by the companies for marketing purposes. Slap a 'cholesterol free!' sticker on this or a 'non-fat!!' label on that, but it's still full of corn syrup or way more sodium than there should be or transfat or is completely devoid of actual nutrients or...well, that label doesn't mean it's healthy.
Even though it sounds like the grocery chain will be the ones actually labeling products in this case, that doesn't mean there is an unbiased 3rd party deciding which products are healthy. Grocery stores DO want to sell stuff and they're hardly going to label 70% of their stock as unhealthy. Besides, companies work with grocery chains to place their products in particular places with particular displays in order to get your money. I'd be pretty shocked if big companies like Campbells, Kraft, etc., wouldn't at least *consider* encouraging the store to favor their products.
You have to read labels. There is absolutely no way around it because no one cares about your health except you. Even small family-owned organic companies want to sell you a product. They may be ethical about it and they may not sell you things that they themselves wouldn't eat, but first and foremost, they have to make money. So if they think that slapping on a 'GLUTEN-FREE!!' sticker on a product that has never, ever in the history of time been made with gluten will help you choose Brand A over Brand B, they'll do it. You can't let the packaging or price be your guiding factor in eating healthy. Lots of products 'look' healthy and the companies want you to think their products are healthy and worth spending extra money on. A lot of them are not. Plain and simple.
I do think that the vegetarian/vegan labels are helpful, though. But I always read the label anyway. More than once, I've found "vegetarian soup" made with chicken stock.