Brussels, 23/06/2014 (Agence Europe) - The European Consumers Bureau (BEUC) said that the EU28's determination to step up the fight against obesity in the European Union is a good thing but that the Council's conclusions on nutrition and physical activity adopted by health ministers in Luxembourg on Friday 20 June, although promising, are very incomplete (see EUROPE 11105).
At a time when one out of three children is overweight or obese in Europe, BEUC welcomes the fact that member states are committed to toughening up their action but expects concrete action and deplores the wait-and-see attitude to colour codes, the solution it believes is the most simple for guiding consumers in the choices they make when purchasing food.
Ilaria Passarani, a health policy expert at BEUC, said that “member states officially acknowledge how seriously obesity strikes Europeans. While this move was long overdue, we now hope national governments will dedicate sufficient financial resources to make these commitments a reality. However, major solutions to fighting diet-related diseases in the EU have been shunned. Front-of-colour coding of nutrient levels can greatly help consumers to identify healthier options and yet this valuable tool is not even mentioned in the Council's text”.
BEUC considers that the voluntary agreements to reduce the fat, sugar and salt contents in packaged foodstuffs have proved to be ineffective and deplores the fact that, “unfortunately, the Council remains too shy to set clear and mandatory reduction targets”.
BEUC is, however, pleased that the Council is encouraging the Commission to establish nutritional profiles, which would help “prevent unhealthy products loaded with sugar, salt and fat from bearing any type of alluring claims. It is now up to the Commission to act upon member states' calls and define its profile as we have been waiting for since 2009” (see EUROPE 9923), stated Passarani. (AN)