Group Takes Aim at Nutritional Labeling
Gorging on snack foods and soft drinks during the last decade has raised American consumers’ sugar intake by 17%, prompting the consumer group Center for Science in the Public Interest on Tuesday to push for more explicit labeling of added sugars on food packages.
The CSPI, along with nutritionists who support the labeling plan, said sugar consumption is a factor in the growing rate of obesity in America.
The Washington-based organization, best known for exposing the nutritional dark sides of movie theater popcorn and Olestra, submitted a petition to the Food & Drug Administration asking it to require separate labeling of added, or refined, sugars as well as showing its portion of the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s recommended daily allowance.
The group is also pressing the agency to remove the claim “healthy” from the packages of products containing high amounts of refined sugar.
Manufacturers and food industry trade groups countered that current labeling, which discloses the amount of total sugar per serving, gives customers all the information they need to choose responsibly.
“Because the human body doesn’t differentiate between added sugars and naturally occurring sugars, we’re already telling consumers what they need to know,” said Sean McBride, a spokesman for the National Soft Drink Assn. in Washington. “This is just confusing.”
Few consumers currently pay much attention to the amount of sugar listed on the nutrition facts label, manufacturers say, mainly because they have no idea how much sugar is unhealthy.
If the FDA required the USDA’s guideline of 40 grams of added sugars for a 2,000 calorie diet to be displayed in labels, the CSPI says, many shoppers would discover that a single serving of their favorite products contain a large percentage of that allowance, if not more. A can of Coke, for instance, contains 95% of a day’s recommended intake.
Indeed, as Americans have been increasing their consumption of snack foods, juices and soft drinks, sugar consumption has spiraled. In the last decade alone, per capita annual consumption of sugar and other sweeteners climbed 17% to 155.6 pounds, according to USDA data from 1998.
“With all the attention being paid to fat, no one’s paying too much attention to what’s happening on the sugar side,” said Marion Nestle, chair of New York University’s Nutrition and Food Studies Program and a supporter of the CSPI’s labeling proposal. “Sugar just encourages people to eat more, and not the kinds of things that nutritionists recommend, like fruit and vegetables.”
The sugar binge also is aiding this country’s slide into obesity, Nestle said. About 55% of the 30,000 adults age 20 and over surveyed by the Centers for Disease Control in 1988-91 were overweight, compared with 46% in a study done between 1976 and 1980.
Nutritionists and CSPI officials claim that separating added sugars from those naturally found in foods and providing a recommended daily allowance for these added sugars helps consumers make healthier food choices and reduce their calorie intake.
Food trade groups counter that more explicit labeling is not what is needed to change this country’s eating habits.
“People need a regular amount of physical activity and more balance in their diet,” said Brian Sansoni, public policy officer for the Grocery Manufacturers of America in Washington. “This whole drive against sugar just obscures that message.”
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Sugar High
Surging sales of juice drinks, sweet snack foods and soft drinks have boosted the nation’s intake of sugar and other caloric sweeteners 17% in the last decade. In pounds, per person per year:
1998: 155.6 pounds per capita
Source: U.S. Department of Agriculture
