What is report trying to fix?
The UK has one of the highest adult obesity rates both within Europe and among high income countries, with 64% of adults classed as overweight or obese.
As a nation, we are generally exceeding recommended intakes of saturated fat, salt and sugar, whilst not meeting guidance on fibre, fruit, veg and oily fish. Overall, we’re estimated to be eating an excess of 200-300 calories a day.
The prevalence of obesity is particularly high in the most deprived areas and is also more commonplace in children. As highlighted in the House of Lords report ‘Recipe for health: a plan to fix our broken food system’, 21.3% of children start primary school overweight or obese. This rises to 36.6% by the time they leave.
The obesity crisis is placing severe pressure on the already strained NHS, with treatment related to poor diets estimated to cost it £6.5bn annually. Additional economic costs come from obesity-related workforce inactivity, with £4bn spent on welfare payments as a result.
And while more recent announcements on weight loss drugs, like semaglutide, may be what some are holding out for, Nesta has estimated that attempting to halve adult obesity by 2030 this way would cost £16.5bn a year.
The extensive report from the House of Lords lays out numerous recommendations to address this crisis. It also addresses current hinderances preventing everyone to access healthy food, setting out actions it believes will ‘force’ the food industry to make such food accessible and affordable for all. For example, what support households struggling to pay energy bills need so they can afford to eat a balanced diet.
Proposals from ‘Recipe for health: a plan to fix our broken food system’
A big part of the report is centred on going further and introducing not just tougher thresholds for current regulations, but also making voluntary policies mandatory ones. The reasoning behind this is underscored early on in the report, which makes mention of previous and countless failings (almost 700 policies between 1992 and 2020) to tackle obesity in England.
Placing the responsibility onto individuals to feed themselves well is blamed for a lack of progress, which the report says is owed to ‘misguided fears’ of being a tarnished as a nanny state.
As such the report calls for a food strategy from UK Government, which sets out targets for a healthy food system and how we can achieve this.
Henry Dimbleby’s national food strategy and the Hungry for Change report – which have both been largely ignored – are mentioned as valuable frameworks and many of the report’s own recommendations are inspired by these previous evaluations.
What would such a strategy entail?
Mandatory health reporting
The report asks that the ‘comprehensive, integrated long-term new strategy’ is underpinned by a new legislative framework. This would see businesses with more than 250 employees reporting on the healthiness of food sales.
Whilst we’re yet to see the outcome of the Food Data Transparency Partnership Health Working Group, we know the concept of mandatory health reporting has been dismissed. The House of Lords report, however, calls on this to become a requirement and for the Group to conclude its work no later than the end of September 2025.
Such a framework, the report suggests, would be overseen by the Food Standards Agency, which would monitor and report on results annually to Parliament against targets such as the sale of ‘healthier’ and ‘less healthy’ foods and overall healthiness of diets.
The healthiness of food would be defined by the Nutrient Profiling Model (NPM), which currently deems whether a food/drink is high in fat, salt and sugar (HFSS). But the report adds that the NPM must be reviewed and updated, with the changes made in 2018 rolled out.
Moreover, it hints that consideration should be given to the inclusion of alcoholic drinks which are not encapsulated within current HFSS rules, despite making significant contributions to energy intakes.
What about ultra processed foods?
Regarding ultra processed foods (UPFs), the report acknowledges that further research is needed, and emerging evidence must be included within the scope of the NPM (which should be continuous reviewed and updated as necessary). At the same time, it emphasises the importance of additional UPF studies being independent and not halting action in the near-term.
Any further studies, the report stipulates, must look at ‘the potential mechanisms of causation linking UPFs with poor health outcomes, health benefits of minimally processed foods, the impact of hyperalatablity and energy density, long term health impacts of specific additives and combination of additives’.
It also adds that businesses that derive more than a defined share of sales from less healthy products should be excluded from any discussions on the formation of policy on food, diet and obesity prevention.
Register for our free webinar discussion, The Unintended Consequences of the UPF Trend, as our panel of industry experts discuss possible regulatory and behavioural shifts and their impact on the UK food and drink sector.
HFSS needs to go further
It suggests that further, immediate action should be taken by extending the HFSS rules, with a total ban across all media by end of this Parliament on the advertising of such food and drink and by businesses that fail to reach healthy sales. It has also proposed that Government extend this ban to the sponsorship of sports events by, and celebrity endorsements of, large food businesses that fail to reach mandatory health targets.
Moreover, it has also suggested that rules around price promotions coming into effect next year should consider encapsulating meal deals.
A tax on salt and sugar
Taking a leaf from Dimbleby’s food strategy, the report suggests the introduction of a salt and sugar tax, stating that the responsibility of future regulatory costs should be laid at the doors of the food industry. The revenue gained from this would then be used by government to make healthier food cheaper.
Make Soft Drinks Levy tougher
It adds that an uprate to the Soft Drinks Levy should also be implemented as soon as possible, so that it keeps pace with consumer price inflation. At the same time, it advises current thresholds must be made tougher and sugar milk-based drinks bought into its scope.
Clearer labels in out-of-home market
Labelling was also referenced in the report’s recommendations, with the suggestion of mandatory labels that clearly signpost healthier and less healthy products. This it said must be extended to out-of-home, so that this industry sees a comparable form of labelling to the in-home sector.
Healthier starts for children and infants
Alongside taxing food and drink producers in an effort to push more affordable, ‘good’ food, the report says the Government must update the Healthy Start Scheme and free school meal allowances which it says have not kept up with rising prices.
The report also flags concerns with school food standards in general, stating that these are not in line with SACN guidance (dietary intakes of free sugars and fibres). To this end, it suggests the introduction of a system that monitors compliance in schools by the end of next year.
Finally, it suggests that the UK Government should ‘immediately’ start publishing quarterly estimates of the costs of a weekly healthy food basket. These findings would then be reported to Parliament alongside progress towards targets on population nutrition and public health.
Food Manufacture will be discussing the recommendations laid out in this report in its upcoming online event – The Unintended Consequences of the UPF Trend. Our panel of industry experts will be looking at the possible shifts we may see within food and drink, how likely change is, and what impact that will have on the UK F&B sector. Register for our UPF roundtable for free here.
Commenting on the House of Lords publication, Baroness Walmsley, chair of the Food, Diet and Obesity Committee, said: “Food should be a pleasure and contribute to our health and wellbeing, but it is making too many people ill. Something must be going wrong if almost two in five children are leaving primary school with overweight or obesity and so many people are finding it hard to feed healthy food to their families. That is why we took a root and branch look at the food system and analysed what had gone wrong over the past few decades.
“Over the last 30 years successive governments have failed to reduce obesity rates, despite hundreds of policy initiatives. This failure is largely due to policies that focused on personal choice and responsibility out of misguided fears of the ‘nanny state’. Both the Government and the food industry must take responsibility for what has gone wrong and take urgent steps to put it right.
“We hope, given the recent comments from the Prime Minister, Lord Darzi and the Secretary of State for Health, that there is now an appetite to shift towards prevention of ill health. We urge the Government to look favourably on our plan to fix our broken food system and accept that not only is it cost-effective, but that it would lead to a lot less human misery.”
In other news, retailers are being urged to set targets for plant-based sales to tip the scales in favour of alternative protein over meat-based.