Survey calls for standardisation of sugar, salt content on packaged food

New Delhi, Jan 31 (PTI) The Economic Survey 2024-25 called upon the Union Health Ministry to "urgently" define nutrient thresholds for sugars, salt, and saturated fats to regulate advertising.

It also urged the central ministry to adopt warning front-of-pack labels (FOPL), and impose stricter marketing restrictions on unhealthy foods, especially targeting children under-18.

Dwelling on the impact of ultra-processed food (UPFs) on physical health, the survey tabled in Parliament stressed that making consumers conscious about what they eat, its ingredients and associated side-effects is important to maintain a healthy lifestyle.

Understanding the ingredients of packaged food, the ill-effects of UPF, and healthy food choices should be a part of the school curriculum, it underscored.

The report emphasised that called for setting standards for permissible levels of salt and sugar and ensuring checks for UPF brands to adhere to the regulations.

Schools, hospitals, and public areas should eliminate UPFs, while incentives should promote affordable healthy food production, it said.

High goods and service tax rates and amendments to consumer protection laws could deter misleading advertising, the report recommended.

Additionally, a coalition of civil society and government entities, free from conflicts of interest, is vital to educate the public and counter food industry interference, it stressed.

Reducing excess calorie intake and improving dietary quality may help prevent many primary and secondary cardiovascular events, said the economic survey.

"Since UPF brands often target children and adolescents, massive awareness of the potential risk factors of UPF is of utmost necessity. Generating health-conscious consumers can further motivate and incentivise various UPF brands to come up with healthy alternatives or minimise the extent of the negative effects of the UPFs," it said.

The report called for an "enormous" behaviour change campaigns and efforts to promote local and seasonal fruits and vegetables and subsidies for healthy foods such as whole foods, millet, fruits, and vegetables.

The survey said that from sweetened breakfast cereals, soft drinks, and energy drinks to fried chicken and packaged cookies, UPFs have undeniably marked their formidable presence in everyday life.

These foods are generally energy-rich with high levels of sugar, salt and unsaturated fats and are nutrient-deficient as they are made from ingredients derived from a limited variety of crops such as wheat or soy, the report claimed.

The National Dietary Guideline 2024 identifies UPFs as food and beverage products that have undergone extensive industrial processing and contain a high number of additives such as preservatives, sweeteners, emulsifiers, and other substances that are not commonly used in culinary preparations, the survey said.

Convenience, hyper-palatability, affordability, longer shelf life and vigorous advertising and marketing strategies have made a conducive environment for the thriving business of UPFs in India, it argued.

The WHO India reports that between 2011 and 2021, the value of retail sales in the UPF segment grew at a CAGR of 13.7 per cent. Though there was a Year-on-year growth rate decline from 12.7 per cent to 5.5 per cent during 2020, the very next year, it was 11.29 per cent, the report stated.

According to the Household Consumption Expenditure Survey (HCES) 2022-23, almost 9.6 per cent of the food budget in rural areas and 10.64 per cent in urban areas is spent on beverages, refreshments, and processed food.

"There is enough research to show that the shift in dietary practices from unprocessed to semi-processed and to UPF items exposes an individual to a wide range of adverse health outcomes ranging from obesity, chronic inflammatory disorders, cardiovascular diseases, and mental disorders," the report said.

Being lower in fibre content, UPFs are observed to lead to weight gain and obesity in adults and children.

Studies from across countries show a direct association between exposure to UPFs and 32 health parameters spanning mortality, cancer, and mental, respiratory, cardiovascular, gastrointestinal, and metabolic health outcomes.

They also indicate that greater exposure to UPFs leads to anxiety outcomes, mental disorder outcomes, prevalent adverse sleep-related outcomes, heart disease-related mortality, type 2 diabetes, depressive outcomes, wheezing, obesity, and cancer and higher risks of mortality.

There are also evidence that UPFs may hamper immunity and lead to increasing gut impermeability, leading to bacterial imbalance in the gut, the report said.

"Increased and frequent consumption of UPF is associated with an increased risk of multimorbidity, which refers to the prevalence of multiple chronic conditions due to non-communicable diseases for an extended period of time," it stated.

According to WHO, non-communicable diseases, or NCDs, are the reason behind the death of 41 million people each year, equivalent to 74 per cent of all deaths globally, the survey report highlighted.

Of all NCD deaths, 77 per cent are in low- and middle-income countries.

The burden of NCD risk factors arises partly from population growth and ageing.

According to the 2017 study report 'India: Health of the Nation's States' by the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR), the proportion of deaths due to NCDs in India increased from 37.9 per cent in 1990 to 61.8 per cent in 2016.

The four major NCDs are cardiovascular diseases, cancers, chronic respiratory diseases, and diabetes. These diseases share four common behavioural risk factors: unhealthy diet, lack of physical activity, tobacco use, and alcohol consumption, the report stated. PTI PLB VN VN

Source: PTI