If there is an ingredient that has a number and no letter, it indicates that it has no nutritional value. The International Numbering System mandates that ingredients with no nutritional value should have a number. The European Union adds the letter E to classify such ingredients.
Organic
If a food claims to be ‘organic’, it must contain 95 per cent of that organic ingredient.
The challenges for every individual reading this book would differ based on the infrastructure and regulations in their respective countries, but the principles of reading the label will largely remain the same. Luckily, there are now abundant tools available on the internet to empower us, just as we have tools to filter out stocks on the markets.
Let us use this ingredient due diligence screener hosted by Whole Truth Foods to do a quick search on three ingredients which are possibly the most consumed in our daily foods.
Three of the most commonly used items in the household are bread, biscuits and butter. Our first preference would be to ditch the first two items on the list altogether, but since that is difficult for many people, let’s see how we can filter out items.
Biscuits
Let’s list the ingredients of a commonly available biscuit and ask the question—apart from salt, what do you recognize?
Wheat flour, sugar, vegetable oil (palm), glucose-fructose syrup, salt, raising agents (ammonium carbonates, sodium hydrogen bicarbonates), artificial flavours and emulsified (mono- and di-acetyl tartaric acid esters of mono- and diglycerides of fatty acids).
Now let’s pick out an ingredient to understand its implication—palm oil.
What Is Palm Oil?
Palm is made from the palm vegetable, also known as ‘heart of palm’. It offers a greater yield at a lower cost of production as compared to any other vegetable oils.
Why Is It Bad?
It has high amounts of saturated fats, and refined palm oil could contain carcinogens (substances capable of causing cancer in living tissue).
What Should I Do?
Avoid.
Also read: How Goa’s iconic ivory statuettes spread Christianity in the 16th–17th centuries
Bread
Let’s list the ingredients of a commonly available loaf of bread and ask the question—apart from salt, what do you recognize?
Refined wheat flour, yeast, sugar, virtual gluten, iodized salt, preservative, improvers, acidity regulator, vitamins.
What Is Acidity Regulator INS 260, or Acetic Acid?
Acetic acid is produced from vinegar, or is synthetically produced from wood fibre or methanol. It’s used to control the acidic or alkaline nature of packaged foods.
Why Is It Bad?
Consumption by some individuals or in large quantities can cause vomiting, nausea and diarrhoea. Over-consumption can result in tooth decay.
What Should I Do?
It’s okay to consume in moderation.
Butter
Butter may contain what is called margarine at the back of the label.
What Is Margarine?
Margarine is used as a substitute for butter in flavouring, baking and cooking. Most margarine consumed today is made from vegetable oil.
Why Is It Bad?
It contains trans fats that can raise people’s LDL cholesterol and can also reduce levels of HDL cholesterol.
These effects can raise the risk of heart attacks, strokes and type2 diabetes.
What Should I Do?
Avoid.
In situations like these, ask yourself two simple questions to make life easier:
1. Do I know what this ingredient is? If not, then why should I consume it?
2. Can I find a safer alternative after going through the first step?
To make this process concise—if we don’t have the patience to go through the entire ingredient list, it is better to go through at least the nutrition facts. So, let’s say we just can’t give up that loaf of bread. Then, we should go for the loaf of bread that has the higher amount of fibre compared to total carbohydrates. At least fibre would keep us full. We can start with these small changes and then progress slowly.
To make this process concise—if we don’t have the patience to go through the entire ingredient list, it is better to go through at least the nutrition facts. So, let’s say we just can’t give up that loaf of bread. Then, we should go for the loaf of bread that has the higher amount of fibre compared to total carbohydrates. At least fibre would keep us full. We can start with these small changes and then progress slowly.
If we start too fast, we will get overwhelmed.
ThePrint broke down a survey conducted by the Indian Council of Medical Research’s National Institute of Nutrition (ICMR-NIN).
The survey highlights the clear lack of cognizance of the consumer in India in terms of looking out for the most important part of a nutrition label—only 9 per cent of consumers read the nutrient information and only 15 per cent read the ingredients list. The brand name and expiry date are the most important information for the consumer.
Studies have shown how changing of attitudes towards nutrition greatly benefitted students at an early age. A study in the journal Neurotherapeutics showed how additives in food could have been linked to ADHD in students.
An interesting case study came from Chile, which implemented the Law of Food Labelling and Advertising in 2016, comprising of mandatory front-of-package (FOP) warning labels, restrictions on child-directed marketing, and the banning of sales in schools of all foods and beverages containing added sugars, sodium or saturated fats that exceeded set nutrient or calorie thresholds. The FOP labels displayed a black stop sign that used warning words of ‘high in’ followed by sugar, sodium, saturated fat or calories. Later analyses found that purchases of sweetened beverages significantly declined following the implementation of this multifaceted law, which was more effective than prior single initiatives, such as a tax on sweetened beverages.
Another study, conducted in 2017 by the United States’ National Bureau of Economic Research, found that when a school signed a contract with a healthy lunch company, students began scoring better on end-of-year academic tests. On average, student test scores were 0.03 to 0.04 standard deviations higher (about four percentile points). Not only that, the test score increases were about 40 per cent larger for students who qualified for reduced-price or free school lunches—these students were the most likely to eat the school lunches.
In India, the FSSAI has started to take positive actions to improve the nutrition and health standards for outlets. According to their new regulations, ‘restaurants having central licences or outlets at ten or more locations will need to display the “calorific value in kcal per serving and serving size” of food items on menu cards, booklets or boards’.
In fact, a study conducted by The BMJ in 2018 in the United States showed that calorie labels in fast-food outlets lead to a small drop in calories purchased.
This excerpt from The Health and Wealth Paradox by Ankush Datar and Mihir Patki has been published with permission from HarperCollins India.