The warning labels that could be coming for your crisps

Mail & Guardian

a day ago

Decrypting the nutritional label on your favourite packaged food products might get easier sometime soon. But that doesn't mean you're going to like what it's going to say. (UNSPLASH)
'It's sort of hidden.'
That's how 30-year-old Elvina Moodley describes the nutritional labels on the back of packaged food products stacked on grocery store shelves. 'When you're there, you're already in a rush and don't have the time to look at the small print on the back to see how much sugar or salt is in an item.'
Moodley, like many South Africans, says she's never really understood how
nutritional tables — the per serving amounts of calories,
But big, bold triangle warning labels on the front of packages could mean making healthy choices will be a lot easier.
South Africa's draft food labelling
It would work, says Edzani Mphaphuli, executive director of the childhood nutrition nonprofit
'You might not know why smoking causes cancer, but when you see the label, you start to think, 'Okay, this might not be good for me,'' she says. 'But [many people] don't know that sugar causes cancer or that obesity is related to cancer. We just think about it as, 'I'm big,' and it ends there. There isn't a clear link that is made around that and hypertension (high blood pressure) and diabetes, and all of the other chronic diseases.'
Why labels are hard to read
Many familiar foods — from noodles and breakfast cereals to
Currently, food labels in South Africa
Even when it does appear, it's often in small writing and uses terms and measurements that an ordinary shopper would not understand, says Makoma Bopape, a nutrition researcher and lecturer at the
'It tells you how much of certain nutrients you get in, say, 100ml or in a serving size. But if you don't have a nutritional science [background] it's hard to know what that means.'
That's why some countries have started to
These labels help shoppers compare products, but they can also confuse them. A UK government
A Chile warning
Not all front-of-pack labels are equal. Research shows that clear warning signs that simply say the food is 'high in' sugar, salt or saturated fats are
Chile was the first country to
The result? After the regulations were enacted, Chileans bought
In 2021, Chilean researchers
Yet obesity rates continued to
In France, manufacturers use what's called
South Africa will use a similar system to Chile, but the label will come in the shape of a triangle.
The warnings will cover between 10% and 25% of the front of the package, will be black on a white background and will be located in the top right corner. They will have the words 'high in' and 'warning' in bold, uppercase letters, next to an exclamation mark and an icon to represent the nutrient. This will help make the warning easier for people who can't read or don't speak English to understand.
Because each nutrient will have its own warning symbol, if a product is high in more than one nutrient — or has any artificial sweeteners at all — a single package could carry up to four warning icons.
'They just want to fill their tummies'
Still, what people — and their children — eat isn't always up to them, says Mphaphuli. 'Some parents can only afford cheap food that fills up the family the quickest, which limits their choice in what they consume.'
In
Most of these households are located outside of the metropolitan areas, where healthy,
'If in your spaza shop one apple costs the same as a bottle of highly concentrated juice that can be shared across days, you're going to go for the cheaper thing.'
When people don't have enough types of food to choose from, they
'People say, 'At the beginning of the month, when I still have money, I get worried and I pay attention to what I buy. But as the month goes by, I just buy whatever I can afford,'' explains Bopape. 'They just want to fill their tummies.'
Clear labelling alone won't be enough to reduce unhealthy eating, says Bopape. Warning signs need to go hand in hand with other policies such as sugar taxes, restrictions on advertising and the selling of unhealthy foods in and around schools.
Moodley wishes healthy foods were more reasonably priced. But the warning labels will at least 'help us know what we're getting ourselves into'.
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