cAndy lines every inch of the Mercado de dulces in the historic center of Mexico City. Tempting strawberry-flavored chocolates and Tajín-covered mango gummies fill the narrow aisles of the winding marketplace. But much of the colorful packaging is tempered somewhat by black stop signs on the front. In addition to dreamy descriptions of creamy and chocolatey treats, the stop signs warn of “Excess Calories” or “Excess Sugars.” For some customers, the warnings are enough to pause and reconsider their purchases.
Latin America is leading the world in a movement to print nutrition warning labels on the front of food packages. Currently, labels warn when a food product exceeds the daily recommended value of a “nutrient of concern” – namely sugar, salt or saturated fat (some countries have added trans fats, artificial sweeteners and caffeine). But research led by scientists across the continent is increasingly pointing toward another factor that consumers may want to consider: how processed food is.
Ultra-processed foods make up an increasing part of the average Latin American consumer’s diet. These industrially formulated products, which often contain high levels of fats, starches, sugars and additives (such as flavourings, colorings and preservatives), were first mentioned and studied by Brazilian researchers in the early 2000s. Nowadays, many Latin Americans get this 20% to 30% of their daily calories from ultra-processed products (in the United States the average is even higher – more than 60%). While the continent leads the world in research into the health impacts of ultra-processed foods, countries there are also taking steps to ensure labels appear on all ultra-processed products, warning consumers of these harms.
IIn the early 2010s, researchers at the Pan American Health Organization, a regional office of the World Health Organization, began discussing the possibility of using front-of-pack labels to rising rates of non-communicable diseases in the region.
“The initial front-of-pack labeling proposals emerged because the information provided to consumers based on the nutrition facts table was “completely insufficient for consumers to understand quickly and easily,” said Fabio Da Silva Gomes, the regional nutrition advisor. and Physical Activity for America at PAHO.
In 2010, Mexico became the first country in the region to place the “daily target amounts” label on the front of packages. (Today, some companies in the U.S. voluntarily print daily suggested amounts on the front of packages in an industry-led program called Facts Up Front.) Then, in 2014, Ecuador introduced a “traffic light” label, which specifies certain colors (red, yellow, and green ) to the levels of various nutrients in packaged foods.
But the landscape really changed when Chile implemented an entirely new label in 2016. Under former President Michelle Bachelet, who trained as a pediatrician, Chile implemented a tax change on sugary drinks in 2014 and began studying front-of-pack label design.
In 2016, it implemented a black label in the shape of a stop sign after research found that the traffic light label used in Ecuador and much of Europe was too colorful (when associated with food, colors actually trigger cravings ). Unfortunately, it was also confusing. Consumers didn’t know which was better: foods with a yellow rating for both sugar and sodium, or one red for saturated fat and one green for sugar. In addition, the country banned the sale and promotion of products with warning labels in schools, limited the marketing of those products to children, and eventually completely banned companies from marketing foods with warning labels.
A 2021 study found that in December 2017, after the label’s introduction, Chilean families bought 27% less sugar and 37% less salt from foods labeled with “high in” warnings than they would have if the labeling and advertising law had not been in place implemented.
The law also encouraged food companies to reformulate their products to contain less salt and sugar so they did not have to print a label.
From Chile, octagonal “warning labels” quickly spread across Latin America.
Today, Peru, Uruguay, Mexico, Argentina and Colombia all require warning labels (and Venezuela is expected to join them in December). Some countries have updated the warning label developed by Chile to include more foods – such as artificial sweeteners and caffeine – and others have introduced taxes to more strongly discourage citizens from buying certain products.
But not all countries have followed the scientific consensus. When Brazil implemented its label in 2022, it introduced a design that was copied in Canada and may be replicated in the US. Instead of the black stop sign, Brazil printed a black and white magnifying glass next to whether the food was high in sugar, salt or saturated fat.
“We don’t actually recognize the Brazilian system as a warning system,” Gomes said. “It’s very small, and this is critical because we know from tobacco warnings that there is a dose response between the size of the warning and the consumer’s response,” meaning that consumers are less likely to purchase tobacco products as the warning label on it is larger. is.
LIn America, it has in some ways been easier to implement front-of-package labeling than the US, because the constitutions of most countries there guarantee a right to health that overrides commercial freedom of expression. “There is much less emphasis on protecting free speech in corporations in particular, and there is a strong emphasis on protecting children,” said Lindsey Smith Taillie, professor of nutrition at the University of North Carolina at the Gillings School of Global Public Health in Chapel Hill. But companies and trade groups have still fought back against labeling initiatives.
While lobbying Lawmakers in countries considering labels, the international food industry, have also threatened to take many governments to the World Trade Organization for allegedly violating free trade agreements that prevent “unnecessary obstacles to international trade.” Gomes says labels do not “restrict” sales of ultra-processed foods, but rather add a “requirement” to bring them to market.
The food industry has also funded research that emphasizes the importance of exercise over diet. Industry documents show that Coca-Cola gave university researchers in the US and Colombia $199,500 to study the role of physical inactivity on obesity, rather than the availability of whole foods.
“The industry is very good at shifting blame,” says Eric Crosbie, professor of behavioral health and health administration and policy at the University of Nevada, Reno. “What they were trying to do was shift the blame onto individuals so that they are not responsible for their products. It’s a classic move that tobacco and alcohol have all done.”
Even where labeling laws are in place, companies have found ways to circumvent these laws. For example, some print a “front” on both the front and back of a package (but only print labels on one side). Or they package food in extra clear plastic packaging so that they can now print banned cartoon characters (to be marketed to children) on the food itself.
Although the concept of ultra-processed foods emerged in Latin America, no country there has a label demarcating UPFs. However, experts say countries are taking steps to change that.
“I would imagine (UPF labels) starting in Latin America because they have been such a leader in this area,” Taillie said. “Ultra-processed foods are part of the dietary guidelines in many Latin American countries,” while in the US “we hear the evidence but don’t have it in our guidelines.”
And current warning labels already cover the majority of UPFs on the market, because so many of them contain high levels of sugar, sodium and saturated fats.
“The evidence suggests that right now in Argentina, Mexico and Colombia, with the warning labels that we have applied with nutritional profile models, we can say with very good confidence that these countries regulate at least 97.98% of ultra-ultra products.” -processed foods, Gomes said. He noted that these countries are also working to “fill this 2% gap” by flagging foods that contain colorings, flavorings, emulsifiers and thickeners used to “imitate real food.”
Although the science surrounding the various components of ultra-processed foods is still emerging, Gomes says the components still warrant labels because their purpose is simply to make unhealthy foods more appealing. “Think about tobacco laws,” he says, pointing to laws banning flavored tobacco products. “We don’t necessarily need evidence about the harm of cosmetic additives to regulate them,” because they are “used only for the purpose of encouraging the consumption of products that are harmful.”
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