Commercial Baby Foods Crisis Revealed In Leeds Research
The UK’s baby food market is awash with “low quality” products with poor nutrition masked by misleading names and on-pack messaging, according to wide ranging research by Leeds scientists.
Weak and out-dated regulations are letting down families and children, the researchers say, and they are now calling for Government action on the market.
A new report launched today – “Commercial Baby Foods in Crisis” – builds on work that started in 2018. This year-long project, funded by The Which? Fund, assessed 632 baby food products marketed towards babies and toddlers under three years old, evaluating their nutrition and on-pack marketing; alongside gathering views from over 1000 parents via a nationally representative survey and focus groups.
The work was carried out by Dr Diane Threapleton, Ali Morpeth and Professor Janet Cade from the School of Food Science and Nutrition at the University of Leeds.
Dr Threapleton said: “Babies and toddlers are in a period of rapid and important growth and good nutrition is needed to support their development. It is therefore critical that commercial products are nutritious options, not laden with sugar. Voluntary guidelines are often ineffective, and so regulation is needed to make sure that change happens.”
“With around 1.7m children between six and 36 months in the UK, ‘baby food’ is a massive market. Widespread availability of inappropriate products with poor nutritional quality will negatively impact child growth and development.”
The research featured in a BBC Panorama investigation into baby food pouches, broadcast on Monday, April 28, but the wider report looks at the whole baby food market including tray meals, snacks and other products.
The products were analysed using the World Health Organisation standards (Nutrient and Promotion Profile Model). Key findings include:
Key parent insights (from focus groups and a survey of 1008 parents of children aged under 3 years):
Dr Threapleton said: “We found the baby food market is packed with low quality products where poor nutrition is often masked by misleading names and on-pack messaging. This is letting families down. Parents expect bought baby foods to be well-regulated and healthy for their young children.”
The research found that large numbers of commonly available and popular baby purees are high in sugary pureed fruit. Confusingly, many are also too watery (low in calories) – therefore not providing young children with the nutrition they need.
Dr Threapleton added: “Commercial baby foods are often highly pureed. When the main ingredients are fruit, this poses a particular problem because the sugar that would be contained within the food matrix, and therefore slowly digested, becomes readily available in the mouth. This means that pureed baby foods taste very sweet, strengthening preferences for sugary foods throughout the life, and teeth are being exposed to high levels of sugar.
Dr Threapleton added: “We know that many parents and carers rely on these commercial baby foods, and in the UK they are so widely available as to be almost unavoidable.”
Ali Morpeth, a registered public health nutritionist and co-author of the study, said baby food regulations are “seriously outdated”.
She added: “We spoke to more than 1000 parents in our research. Many were shocked to learn that there are no regulations for sugar in baby foods, and there was wide-spread support for front-of-pack labels to indicate high sugar content.
“Voluntary standards are notoriously ineffective in driving industry change for public health – so we believe Government must set mandatory regulations to improve the market for babies.”
“We want manufacturers and retailers to improve the way they formulate and market these products, making the health and nutrition of our youngest children their top priority.”
“We also believe the Government should be stepping in with regulations, so that anyone caring for young children can have confidence the products they can access are giving their children the best possible start in life.”
The research also highlights widespread use of “halo marketing” – the practice of using vague but misleading messaging to give products an appearance of health, masking concerns about their actual composition.
For example:
The researchers are urging the UK Government to follow WHO advice and ban all nutrition, health or marketing claims on baby food packaging in order to eliminate the “health-halo” effect and help families make the best choices for their children based on accurate information.
Professor Cade leads the Nutritional Epidemiology Group at the University of Leeds, and chairs the advisory board of the British Nutrition Foundation in a voluntary capacity. She, Dr Threapleton and Ali Morpeth worked with the World Health Organisation (WHO) to draw up a Nutrient and Promotion Profile Model (NPPM) which set out nutritional and marketing standards for baby foods.
They are urging the UK Government to adopt this ready-made tool in order to bring up standards in the baby food market.
Professor Cade added: “We need to help parents to protect young children because we know that diet in early life sets the scene for later health outcomes.
“Poor diet in the first years of life has been linked with higher rates of chronic disease, including diabetes and obesity.
“Our research clearly shows that the current situation needs to change. Existing regulations are insufficient and out-dated.”
Specific recommendations to manufacturers and retailers include:
Dr Threapleton and Ali Morpeth have produced information for parents, including a list of “simple swaps” to improve young children’s nutrition in a realistic and achievable way. They include:
Sue Davies, Which? Head of Food Policy, said: “It’s unacceptable that so many foods and snacks aimed at babies have such poor nutritional quality and high sugar levels.
“To make matters worse, these items are often misleadingly marketed as being healthy – making it difficult for parents to make informed choices about the best products to buy for their children.
“The Government urgently needs to update the out-of-date laws for commercial baby foods to ensure there are tighter controls on their composition – including limits on their sugar and salt content – make labelling clear and upfront and clamp down on any misleading marketing claims that suggest products are healthier than they really are.”
Barbara Crowther, Children’s Food Campaign Manager at Sustain, who supported the parent polling as part of the research, said: “All babies and children have a right to grow up healthy, but overwhelmingly the commercial baby and toddler food industry is misleading parents about the nutritional benefits of their products. Millions of parents regularly use these brands and want to trust them, so they’re shocked and angry to learn the truth – that they’re not nearly as healthy as they claim to be, and they’re not even being regulated properly.
“This excellent but shocking new analysis from the University of Leeds should be a wake-up call to the government – it’s time to wean ourselves off a reliance on voluntary guidance for the infant food industry and bring in strict regulation, based on the excellent World Health Organisation standards for product composition and marketing of infant foods. Let’s put babies and toddlers at the forefront of our efforts to create the healthiest ever generation of children and stop sugarcoating these pouches and products.”
https://www.leeds.ac.uk/news-health/news/article/5767/commercial-baby-foods-crisis-revealed-in-leeds-research