Traffic light labelling means less fat, salt and sugar reformulation, says M&S

Traffic light labelling has prompted less reformulation on products high in fat, salt and sugar than guideline daily amount (GDA) per portion labelling, contrary to popular opinion, according to Marks & Spencer (M&S).

M&S has chosen hybrid front of pack labelling combining GDAs and the Food Standards Agency's (FSA's) traffic light system. The latter allocates a red, amber or green dot according to their fat, salt and sugar content per 100g.

However, some products that were traditionally high in fat would remain 'in the red' even after substantial reformulation because thresholds were so broad, said M&S company nutritionist Claire Hughes at a Food and Drink Innovation Network conference last month on the Healthy middle years. This provided little incentive to reformulate as "certain products will always be red for fat"

A more useful colour coding system would enable people to better compare similar products, she said: "I'd like to see category specific colour coding."

As for salt, meeting FSA targets for 2012 was going to be very challenging for M&S, which had already been taking customers on a journey "faster than they want to go", said Hughes. "We have already had quite a lot of complaints in some categories because we have been taking salt out too fast. We were just getting to grips with the 2010 targets and then they moved the goalposts again with new targets for 2012."