A recent survey of United Kingdom consumers found that a majority of Britons want a brand tax on unnecessary and ultra-processed food products, believing it would address the obesity crisis.
Consumers in the United Kingdom appear to be embroiled in a developing vendetta against UPF: roughly two-thirds (62%) of consumers say, according to a Health Foundation survey, that bad food ads should be banned from TV and online before nine. p. m. , as well as 53% of them. demand a tax on UPF brands.
But it’s not just the British. European consumers also vilify UPFs, with 67% believing they contribute to emerging degrees of obesity and other fitness problems, according to a recent survey by the EIT Food Consumer Observatory.
EU citizens also have less acceptance of UPFs in general: 40% say the industry is not sufficiently regulated and 67% dislike foods that contain unrecognizable ingredients.
So, if such a tax were implemented, what effect would it have on manufacturers?And would this assistance reduce consumers’ waistlines?
Releasing a UPF tax would be difficult to manage and would most likely not address customer concerns, according to Danny Butt, director of consultancy Food Innovation Solutions. “If you communicate at a macro level, like a tax, it may simply be similar to the sugar tax [in the UK], so if it’s built around that, you’ll end up in a scenario where some brands will have to reduce prices or absorb [the tax]. “
And then there is the permanent debate about what a UPF is. Consumers think that UPFs are junk food rich in fat, salt and sugar, “but when they are told that they are also their deli meats in the refrigerator, their opinion changes. Butt says, “They don’t need food taxes like that. ”
“The UPF tax poses a wide range of problems,” says Klaus Grunert, director of the EIT’s Food Consumer Observatory and professor at Aarhus University in Denmark. “There is no transparent definition of what a UPF is. There will have to be a definition of what it is, but this is up to regulators, who will rely on the expertise of nutritionists.
If a tax were implemented, Grunert suggests it could simply be based on the excess negative nutrients a product contains, rather than the processing point used to produce it. “But in Denmark, for a brief period [in 2011], we had a tax on saturated fats that didn’t [and was repealed in 2012] because of all sorts of practical problems,” he acknowledges. he. However, Butt suggests employing a smooth traffic system.
Professional bodies and food industry stakeholders already use rough definitions of food processing grades in the Nova classification system. It classifies foods into categories based on the degree of processing, such as unprocessed, processed, processed, or ultra-processed foods. But it has been criticized for not specifying whether UPF is “healthy” or “unhealthy” and for relying on processing degrees and not nutrition degrees.
Lately there is no formal agreement on what a UPF of fear would be or how it would be classified in terms of “good” and “bad. “
And with that, there’s a desire to teach consumers about UPF as a whole, but, as Butt and Grunert point out, it’s not a linear story. “People have to make their own decisions, and it all starts with education,” Butt says. “However, rarely are even a few pieces of data more damaging than no data,” he adds, noting that domestic and foreign media policy only includes junk food in the UPF category, when it is a much broader picture than that.
A lack of customer education about UPF is a major issue, a point highlighted across various datasets in recent months. In the EIT Food Consumer Observatory study, customers found that it was complicated to classify foods in Nova’s classifications, indicating a lack of knowledge.
“Unless something [robust] is put in place, the debate [about what UPF is] continues to go around in circles,” Butt says. “When dealing with consumers, they can’t tell the difference between an additive and a ‘bad’ one. . ‘
“Unless someone makes a practical decision, there probably won’t be a standalone and useful rule to work with. But the industry wants to talk more about the processes used.
Regarding the surveillance of the UPF, Butt and Grunert agree that it is the task of governments. And while governments might hesitate now, as the debate and demonization of certain foods intensifies, they may soon have to so that certain brands can paint into transparent frameworks.