Brussels, July 3 - Europe's vast food and drinks industry has agreed voluntary guidelines on labelling products for nutritional content to help consumers pursue healthier lifestyles, the EU's umbrella industry body said on Monday.
The guidelines are based on a uniform list of nutrients, calories per serving and recommended daily intakes, the Confederation of Food and Drink Industries (CIAA) said. Both the front and back of packaging should be labelled, it added.
"Even though this is a voluntary recommendation, we hope and expect a critical mass of companies to work rapidly towards adoption of the principles behind this system," CIAA President Jean Martin said in a statement.
But it would take more than changes in food labelling for busy consumers to achieve healthier lifestyles, he said, adding that common labelling rules would go a long way to help people make better informed dietary choices.
CIAA, the food and drink industry's umbrella group in Europe, counts major companies such as ADM , Cadbury Schweppes Plc , Danone , Kraft Foods Inc and Unilever among its members.
It said the front packaging of a food product should carry a "clear statement" of the calories per serving, along with the percent of guideline daily amounts (GDAs) for items like energy, fat, sugars and salt that these calories represented.
For the back, there should be a list of nutrients -- including proteins, carbohydrates, sugars, fats and saturated fats, fibre and sodium/salt -- more nutrition information per serving, and actual GDAs for the items listed on the front.
CIAA's recommendations will feed into the EU's wider debate on health and nutrition claims, a three-year saga that should end this autumn with a vote in the European Parliament.
Once the updated rules come into force, as they are expected to do shortly after the Parliament vote, EU food and drink makers using phrases such as "low fat", "high energy" or "low alcohol" on products will have to use stricter definitions.
Under the new rules, a producer can make a claim concerning fat, sugar, salt or energy only if it meets certain standards.
If it is making a claim about a positive aspect of a product, it must also clearly detail any negative points -- if there are any. For example, if a product has a low amount of sugar, but a lot more salt, then the label will have to say "low in sugar, but high salt content".
Up until now, the food and drinks industry has been subject to the individual laws of the bloc's 25 member states.
Fresh food such as fruit, vegetables and bread are excluded from the new rules, while products with trademarks can continue to be marketed in their current form for another 15 years.