Thursday, December 11, 2008

Why Your Child's Food isn't "Bone Stiffening"


I love this story.

So in 2006 the European Food Safety Authority tightened up the requirements for health claims on packaging. They (gasp) required a more rigorous proof be made by corporate applicants that the front-of-package claim was actually scientifically defensible.

So what's happening?

Apparently Big Food is up in arms because sales are suffering as claims like the one put forth by the Beneo-Orafti corporation that was slotted to appear on kids' foods suggesting that the food was "bone stiffening" are not making the cut.

For icing on this blog post, check out this quote from Shane Starling, editor of Big Food newsletter (and source for many of my blog posts) Nutraingredients,

"If one of the aims of the health claims process is to build consumer confidence in healthy food messaging, a mass rejection of those claims by an apparently rational and independent body can only do the opposite."
Yup Shane, it's those crazy rational independent bodies demanding an evidence-based approach to health claims that are going to crush consumer confidence, not asinine and scientifically unsubstantiable claims like, "bone stiffening".