Argentina’s Congress approved a new law obliging the food industry to include packaging labels alerting the consumer as to excessive sugar, fat and sodium content. The labels must read “excessive sugar,” “excessive sodium,” “excessive saturated fat,” “excessive total fat” and “excessive calories,” as well as alerting whether caffeine or sweeteners are contained, two components not recommended for child consumption.The food industry will be given 180 days to adapt to the new rules. Read more

The post Argentina’s Congress passes food labelling law appeared first on Stop Marketing to Kids Coalition.

A healthy diet was linked to better mental health and wellbeing, highlighting the need for more strategies to warn families off junk food, according to a new study. The research, led by the Murdoch Children’s Research Institute and published in the British Journal of Nutrition, found that diets high in inflammatory foods were associated with poorer mental wellbeing in children aged 11 to 12 years. Highly processed foods, including those high in sugar or salt, are known to cause inflammation and negatively affect physical health. Read more

The post Healthy diets linked to better mental health and wellbeing appeared first on Stop Marketing to Kids Coalition.

Nearly two-thirds of the yogurts marketed at children provide at least a third of a four- to six-year-old’s maximum daily intake of added sugars, according to research that calls for a ban on child-friendly packaging. Katharine Jenner, the campaign director at Action on Sugar, said: “Clever marketing techniques such as advertising, promotions and packaging are powerful tools to get children hooked on the sweet stuff from a young age and for life.” Read more

The post Sugary UK children’s yoghurts named and shamed by researchers appeared first on Stop Marketing to Kids Coalition.

Two-thirds — or 67% — of calories consumed by children and adolescents in 2018 came from ultra-processed foods, a jump from 61% in 1999, according to a peer-reviewed study published in the medical journal JAMA. Read more 

The post If You Think Kids Are Eating Mostly Junk Food, A New Study Finds You’re Right appeared first on Stop Marketing to Kids Coalition.

Following the news that the province of Newfoundland & Labrador was introducing a sugar levy in April 2022, Stop Marketing to Kids Coalition co-chair Dr. Tom Warshawski was interviewed on CBC Radio’s Maritimes Connection program to discuss the benefits of a sugar levy. Listen here

The post Would you support a sugar tax? appeared first on Stop Marketing to Kids Coalition.

The study assessed 20,060 participants (61.5% women) from the SUN project (Seguimiento Universidad de Navarra) followed-up every two years. Food and drink consumption were evaluated through a validated 136-item food frequency questionnaire and grouped according to their degree of processing by the NOVA classification. The study found that a higher intake of ultra-processed food was independently associated with a higher risk for type 2 diabetes. Read more

The post Ultra-processed foods and type-2 diabetes risk in the sun project: A prospective cohort study appeared first on Stop Marketing to Kids Coalition.

A study out of the University of Cambridge found that, a year after the introduction of a sugar tax in the UK, people were still purchasing the same amount of soft drink but consuming 10% less sugar. The results are described in a paper published in The BMJ. The UK introduced the Soft Drinks Industry Levy (SDIL) on soft-drink manufacturers in April 2018. Drinks with more than 8g sugar per 100mL are taxed at £0.24/L, and drinks with 5–8g sugar per 100mL are taxed at £0.18/L. The tax aimed to encourage manufacturers to reduce the amount of sugar in their drinks. Read more

The post Taxing sugar is good for all appeared first on Stop Marketing to Kids Coalition.

The Spanish food industry is promoting unhealthy products for breakfast, according to Mireia Montaña Blasco from the Open University of Catalonia, who has undertaken research in response to rising obesity rates in Mediterranean countries. In total, the researcher analyzed 355 advertisements from 117 different products that appeared across Spanish media including the internet, television, radio, print and outdoor advertising.  Among the findings was that a vast majority of those targeted at children had an average sugar content of 36.2% compared to 10.25% for those targeted at adults. In Spain one in three children are overweight and the country has the highest proportion of childhood obesity in Europe. Read more

The post Are high-sugar adverts contributing to obesity in Mediterranean countries? appeared first on Stop Marketing to Kids Coalition.

The post Covid 19 coronavirus: Junk food companies accused of ‘Covid-washing’ during lockdown appeared first on Stop Marketing to Kids Coalition.

The post Raiding your cupboards like a vending machine? Big Food is feeding our snack addiction appeared first on Stop Marketing to Kids Coalition.