Latest News! EU-funded research project FLABEL announces its final results on nutrition labelling
Listen in to FLABEL’s webinar (50 min) from Tuesday 31st January 2012 at 9:30 a.m. CET (8:30 a.m. GMT) .
Nutrition labels are a potentially useful tool for enabling consumers to make healthier choices about food. However, scientific insights into how these labels are used in real-life shopping situations are limited. The pan-European project FLABEL (Food Labelling to Advance Better Education for Life) was set up to fully examine the factors which lead from labelling to dietary intake. FLABEL, which involved academic experts from eight European universities, two major retail organisations, and representatives of European consumer, retail and industry associations, has provided state-of-the-art research on consumer behaviour and nutrition labels. The results from this three-and-a-half-year project will be presented in a webinar by Prof. Klaus Grunert from Aarhus University, Denmark, who is FLABEL’s Scientific Advisor, following a brief introduction by Dr. Laura Fernández Celemín from EUFIC, who is the FLABEL Coordinator. The webinar can be accessed free of charge but you are required to register.
To go to the registration page, click here.
FLABEL leaflets
Click here to download the FLABEL final leaflet with the main project results
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These are the final results from the FLABEL project (Food Labelling to Advance Better Education for Life). The project provides state-of-the-art research on consumer behaviour and nutrition labels, and will provide guidelines for research, industry and policy-makers.
Nutrition labelling may be a quick guide to inform consumers about the nutritional value of different products, however use and actual effects on shopping basket composition have been largely unknown. Additionally, the different formats already in place (Nutrition table, Traffic Light scheme, Guideline Daily Amounts (GDA), Health Logos, etc.) may stimulate different responses. FLABEL therefore aimed to fully examine the aspects that lead from label availability to effects on dietary intake.
In an EU-wide nutrition labelling audit carried out in 84 retail stores, more than 37,000 products of five product categories, sweet biscuits, breakfast cereals, chilled pre-packed ready meals, carbonated soft drinks, and yoghurts were examined. FLABEL found that 85% of all products carried nutrition information on the back of the pack, and 48% on the front of the pack. The most widespread back of pack format was the tabular or linear listing of calorific value and nutrient composition at 84%; whereas nutrition claims and GDA were the most prevalent forms of front of pack nutrition information, both averaging 25%.
When information was provided on key nutrients (i.e. fat, saturated fat, sugar and salt) and energy, most consumers were able to correctly rank products according to healthiness. Additional information, such as Health Logos, GDA or Traffic Lights, only marginally improved the accuracy of this ranking.
Consumers in the study said they preferred labels that provide complete information, but consumer liking and intention to use these labels, was not translated into actual product choices.
A big issue affecting the impact of nutrition labels on actual food purchases made by consumers was lack of attention to the nutrition information. FLABEL found that food packages held consumers’ visual attention for very short periods, with the average attention to elements of nutrition labels being between 25 and 100 milliseconds, as measured by sophisticated eye-tracking equipment.
FLABEL Scientific Advisor Professor Klaus Grunert, of
Motivation was a major factor affecting the impact of nutrition labels on the choices made by consumers. Grunert explains that “when prompted, consumers were able to identify which products were healthier, but they did not use this information to choose which product they prefer. A lack of consumer motivation, therefore, is one factor standing in the way of healthy food choices resulting from nutrition labelling.”
These results will be presented on Thursday 24 November and Friday 25 November at the final FLABEL conference and consensus workshop with key stakeholders, where the implications of the project results will be discussed.
The FLABEL consortium is comprised of 13 partners from 8 countries, ranging from academic experts, retailers, SME-representatives to not-for-profit organisations, and is thus well placed to provide key insights into the role that nutrition information on food labels plays.
Notes to editors
About FLABEL
FLABEL - Food Labelling to Advance Better Education for Life - receives research funding from the European Community's Seventh Framework Programme (Contract n° 211905). See www.flabel.org
Professor Klaus G. Grunert
Klaus Grunert is Professor of Marketing at
Prof. Grunert has done extensive research in the areas of consumer quality perception and food choice, and insights into consumer behaviour. As director of MAPP, he has carried out more than 50 collaboration projects including several pan-European studies. He is the author of 12 books, over 80 academic papers in international refereed journals and numerous other publications.
Klaus Grunert is a past president of the
About the European Food Information Council (EUFIC):
The European Food Information Council (EUFIC) is a non-profit organisation which provides science-based information on food safety & quality and health & nutrition to the media, health and nutrition professionals and educators, in a way that promotes consumer understanding. EUFIC receives funding from companies in the European Food and Drink sector, and from the European Commission on a project basis.
For more information about EUFIC see http://www.eufic.org/.
For more media information please contact Sofia Kuhn, European Food Information Council (EUFIC)
Tel: +32 (0) 486 673 942
E-mail: [email protected]
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European Journal of Clinical Nutrition publishes FLABEL audit on nutrition labelling
To download the full publication, please click here.
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FLABEL project reaches mid-point - what has been achieved over the first 18 months?
Brussels, 18 June 2010 – The FLABEL mid-term Scientific Review took place on April 29th, 2010, with two independent scientific reviewers present, as well as the European Commission Project Scientific Officer, and the Work Package leaders. The overall assessment of the reviewers is that good progress has been made, with most objectives and technical goals achieved. It was felt that the deliverables achieved to date make a novel contribution to the overall field of study.
To review the achievements so far, please click here.
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Nutrition labelling: 85% penetration across Europe, finds EU study
Brussels, 30 April 2009 – Today the EU project FLABEL (Food Labelling to Advance Better Education for Life, www.flabel.org/) announces its first research results. An audit of the penetration of nutrition information recorded data from more than 37,000 products from 5 food and beverage product categories in retailers across the EU 27 Member States and Turkey.
Main findings
On average 85% of the products audited contained nutrition information on the back of pack, ranging from 70% for Cyprus and Slovenia to more than 95% for Ireland, UK and The Netherlands. Front-of-pack nutrition information was found on average on 48% of all products, reaching as high as 82% in the UK.
By far the most wide-spread format across all countries was the tabular or linear listing of nutrient composition on the back of packs, stating either the big 4 (calories, protein, carbohydrates, fat) or the big 8 (big 4 plus sugar, saturated fat, fibre and sodium).
Overall, breakfast cereals was the category with the highest penetration of nutrition information, displaying nutrition information back of pack on 94% of products and front of pack on 70% of products.
Nutrition claims were on average on 25% of the products audited, ranging from 12% in Estonia to 37% in Ireland and Portugal. Guideline Daily Amounts (GDA) were on average on 25% of products, ranging from 2% in Turkey to 63% in the UK. Nutrition claims and GDAs were the most prevalent forms of nutrition information on the front-of-pack.
Methodology
In each country, the audits were conducted in three types of retail store: a retailer within the top 5 in terms of market share, a consumer cooperative or national retailer and a discounter.
More than 50 different retail stores co-operated with the study. All products within the following categories were examined: sweet biscuits, breakfast cereals, ready meals, carbonated soft drinks and yoghurts. A data collection grid was designed to record where nutrition information occurred on the pack (back-of-pack vs. elsewhere), in which format it was given (e.g.nutrition table), which nutrients were stated and whether nutrition or health claims were present.
Next steps
Nutrition labelling, whilst voluntary in Europe except when a nutrition or health claim is made, was found on a large majority of products audited and its presence seems higher than reported previously. These findings provide a solid base for subsequent FLABEL studies involving attention, reading, liking, understanding and use by consumers of different nutrition labelling formats.
Click here to listen to the webinar presentation of these FLABEL project results.
About FLABEL
FLABEL receives research funding from the European Community's Seventh Framework Programme (Contract n° 211905). Its objective is to understand how nutrition information on food labels affects dietary choices and consumer habits. This project commenced August 2008, and will end in July 2011.
More information can be found at www.flabel.org
Enquiries? Dr. Stefan Storcksdieck genannt Bonsmann +32 2 506 89 83 or mail: [email protected]