A group of food and drink majors, including Danone and Carlsberg, have committed to report “healthy” sales data in the UK ahead of mandatory rules.
The companies set out the plan in a letter to the UK Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, agreeing to “voluntarily” disclose the figures from next year.
The signatories also include Intersnack subsidiary KP Snacks, frozen-food group Nomad Foods and Mr Kipling cakes maker Premier Foods plc.
In the letter, they said they are “committed to sharing their experiences of introducing reporting, the pitfalls and the watchouts, to help other companies adopt the approach and to support government in designing a system that is both robust and workable at scale within this Parliament”.
The effort is expected to generate “consistent data and evidence” to help shape future policy decisions.
The planned reporting will rely on the UK's existing Nutrient Profiling Model. In January, the UK government published plans to change the model, which classifies the health credentials of food and drinks sold in the country. A consultation process on the plans closed in June.
According to the manufacturers, using the current model should speed up the introduction of the reporting because it is already embedded in company systems and avoids the need for fresh methodologies to be negotiated with government.
Just Food has asked The Food and Drink Federation, which published the letter, to ask what the signatories will do if the model is changed.
In a statement, Karen Betts, the CEO of the Food and Drink Federation (FDF), said the “data and transparency that reporting will bring will incentivise companies to double down on progress, and give government a valuable tool to measure the impact of health policies”.
She added: “In this way, this group of early-movers can test the best ways to collate and report data to support our broader sector and government in informing any future legislation.”
In the statement, Richard Hall, the vice president and general secretary at Danone's North Europe subsidiary, said: “The more we collectively measure and share, the easier it is to see what’s working, where barriers remain and the opportunities to accelerate progress towards better health outcomes.”
The letter also points out to the possibility of the initiative expanding. “We expect the number of early adopters to grow as manufacturers iron out complex challenges, such as how to reflect mergers and acquisitions or split out UK-specific reporting from current global reporting commitments,” it read.
In July, the UK's House of Commons Health and Social Care Committee said ministers should move faster on policies designed to “fix a food environment that pushes consumers towards high fat, sugar and salt products”. The committee said obesity costs the UK £74.3bn ($99.67bn) each year.
