LONDON, 2016-Sep-30 — /EPR Retail News/ — The Government’s Childhood Obesity Plan will have the desired impact only if it ensures the full and equal participation of all companies across every part of the food industry.
Retailers are concerned that the Plan as it stands, relies too heavily on voluntary agreements which have in the past resulted in significantly different levels of effort from the various parts of the industry. The Government must therefore play an active leadership role in delivering the Plan, commit sufficient resources and demonstrate that the proposed voluntary approach will create a level playing field across industry.
Andrew Opie, BRC Director of Food and Sustainability said: “As an industry, we are proud of the leading role that we have played in reformulating our products, promoting healthier alternatives and adopting easy to use on-pack nutritional labelling. In recent years, progressive retailers have found themselves at a competitive disadvantage against those companies which have been slower to reformulate, which is why we had previously called for sugar targets to be mandatory rather than voluntary. Government must now show real leadership in getting every single food company to commit fully and play its part”.
For media enquiries:
Zoe Maddison
Communications Assistant, BRC
Tel: +44 (0)20 7854 8924
Zoe.maddison@brc.org.uk
Source: BRC