Do Nutrient-Based Front-of-Pack Labelling Schemes Support or Undermine Food-Based Dietary Guideline Recommendations? Lessons from the Australian Health Star Rating System.

Julie Woods,Sarah Dickie,Mark Lawrence

doi:10.3390/nu10010032

Abstract

Food-based Dietary Guidelines (FBDGs) promote healthy dietary patterns. Nutrient-based Front-of-Pack Labelling (NBFOPL) schemes rate the ‘healthiness’ of individual foods. This study aimed to investigate whether the Australian Health Star Rating (HSR) system aligns with the Australian Dietary Guidelines (ADGs). The Mintel Global New Products Database was searched for every new food product displaying a HSR entering the Australian marketplace from 27 June 2014 (HSR system endorsement) until 30 June 2017. Foods were categorised as either a five food group (FFG) food or ‘discretionary’ food in accordance with ADG recommendations. Ten percent (1269/12,108) of new food products displayed a HSR, of which 57% were FFG foods. The median number of ‘health’ stars displayed on discretionary foods (2.5; range: 0.5–5) was significantly lower (p < 0.05) than FFG foods (4.0; range: 0.5–5), although a high frequency of anomalies and overlap in the number of stars across the two food categories was observed, with 56.7% of discretionary foods displaying ≥2.5 stars. The HSR system is undermining the ADG recommendations through facilitating the marketing of discretionary foods. Adjusting the HSR’s algorithm might correct certain technical flaws. However, supporting the ADGs requires reform of the HSR’s design to demarcate the food source (FFG versus discretionary food) of a nutrient.

Highlights

Dietary risk factors are the leading contributors to the global burden of disease [1]
The majority of the sample was five food group (FFG) foods (57.2%), and of these, grains were represented at the highest frequency (27%), and dairy products at the lowest frequency (6.6%) (Table 1)
Nutrient-based Health Star Rating (HSR) displayed on a substantial proportion of foods are non-concordant with food-based advice to increase consumption of FFG foods and reduce consumption of discretionary foods

Summary

Introduction

Dietary risk factors are the leading contributors to the global burden of disease [1]. Over the past four to five decades, Food-based Dietary Guidelines (FBDGs) have been developed in more than 100 countries to provide advice to the general public on foods, food groups and dietary patterns to tackle these dietary risk factors, to promote overall health and prevent obesity and diet-related non-communicable diseases (NCDs) [2]. FBDGs and NBFOPL schemes represent evidence-informed manifestations of two alternative paradigms of nutrition science about the causes of and solutions to dietary risk factors. NBFOPL schemes operate within a reductionist paradigm in which the causes of dietary risk factors are seen to be Nutrients 2018, 10, 32; doi:10.3390/nu10010032 www.mdpi.com/journal/nutrients

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