[4-1330-C] Functional/Wellness Foods & Nutrition (1)

[4-1330-C-01] The Influence of The Front-of-Pack Nutrition Labelling Schemes on Helping Healthier Food Choices by Consumer

*Rosires Deliza¹, Marcela Alcantara², Renata Vaqueiro Pereira³, Gastón Ares⁴ (1. Embrapa Food Technology(Brazil), 2. PDJ_CNPq/Embrapa Food Technology(Brazil), 3. Federal Rural University of Rio de Janeiro(Brazil), 4. Universidad de la República(Uruguay))

キーワード：Nutritional Warnings, Guideline Daily Amounts, Front-of-pack, Nutrition information, Food policy

Several new graphic designs for FOP nutrition labelling schemes are being developed worldwide; therefore, it is necessary to get an understanding of how they can influence the efficacy to facilitate the identification of nutrients associated with non-communicable diseases (NCDs). In the present work five nutritional warnings (black and red magnifier, black octagon, black triangle and red circle) that are being considered by Brazilian national authorities for implementing in the country, was compared with two of the most studied schemes (the guidelines daily amounts (GDA) and the traffic-light system) in terms of the perception of the product healthfulness by consumer. Fictitious labels of eight product categories frequently consumed in Brazil were considered: sponge cake, orange nectar, frozen lasagna, cereal bar, breakfast cereal, chocolate flavoured milk, yogurt and savoury snack. For this, an online survey with 1932 participants from the five regions of the country was carried out to evaluate their ability to use FOP nutrition labelling schemes to correctly identify the most healthful product in a set, as well as the high nutrient content in a product. In addition, the influence of FOP nutrition labelling schemes on perceived healthfulness was evaluated. Finally, consumers’ perception of the schemes was gathered using an open-ended question. As expected, the GDA system showed the worst performance in terms of consumers’ ability to identify the most healthful product in a set, and to identify products with high content of nutrients associated with NCDs. All the schemes that included textual or graphical interpretation aids showed a similar performance in improving consumers’ ability to identify the most healthful product in a set of alternatives. However, the schemes based on familiar marks (the traffic-light, red circle, black octagon and black triangle) tended to show better performance compared to the red and black magnifier. Consumers showed a positive attitudes towards all the FOP nutrition labelling schemes, in line with previous studies that have highlighted that this public policy is strongly supported by citizens.