Nutrition labelling: Are large fonts enough?

Last month, the Food Safety and L Standards Authority of India (Essai) approved an amendment to the Safety and Standards (Labelling and Display) Regulations, 2020 (Business Standard, July 9, 2024).

- AMBI PARAMESWARAN

Accordingly, packaged foods will now have to display information regarding salt, sugar, and saturated fat content in bold and relatively large font. The move has been driven by the fact that India is facing increasing levels of obesity and a diabetes crisis, triggered by improper dietary habits. The hope is that improving the information displayed will impart a greater level of consumer consciousness about the nutritional content of foods they consume.

The big question is, will it make a difference? And when did all this start? US authorities mandated the display of nutritional content on packaged foods in 1994; the UK followed in 1998. It was a full 10 years later that Indian authorities made it mandatory (though several global majors present in India had adopted the display practices earlier). The move by the authorities in the US and UK was triggered by the alarming rise of lifestyle illnesses caused by improper dietary habits. In a sense, it seems nothing much has changed in 30 years.

While the intentions have been laudable, across the world there has been criticism about nutrition labelling, calling it less visible, difficult to comprehend, and of limited effectiveness. A variation of the back-of-pack nutrition label is the frontof-pack display of health-star rating. In this Australasian system, foods are labelled as half-star (not healthy) to five-star (most healthy). An expert committee set up by the Fssai (Government of India) comprising IIM Ahmedabad faculty recommended a front-of-pack star system.