CELL PHONE APPLICATION FOR FOOD CHECKING FOOD QUALITY!

Consumers these days are really concerned about the food products available in the market, especially with regard to the impact of these products from the industry on their health. While countries like the US are in the grip of the so called obesity epidemic due to consumption of commercial foods, most of them calorie dense and nutrient light, the potential for this danger in many developing countries like India is increasing day by day due to high economic growth and expansion of food processing industry. Fortunately the proportion of such industrial foods in the diet in these countries is still relatively low, about 20-30% compared to 70-80% among the population in some of the wealthy countries. If this trend is to be arrested or reversed, better "front of the label" information will have to be provided to the consumer. The traffic light system that categorizes the food into three distinct groups is a good idea but industry seems to be opposing such a system to be made mandatory. The mobile phone application has now emerged that can distinguish foods on the retail shelves and help consumers to pick those which are good for the health. Here is a take on this new development.

'The Obesity Policy Coalition says the new Traffic Light Food Tracker will allow shoppers to bypass the food industry's reluctance to support traffic light labelling. Traffic light labelling puts red warnings on foods high in fat, sugar and salt, and green labels on healthy options. Users can enter the fat, sugar and sodium quantities in their food items and save each item in their "pantry" within the phone app. Earlier this year, a review of Australia's food labelling laws failed to recommend a mandatory traffic light system for unhealthy foods, saying the system should only be implemented on a voluntary basis. The Federal Government is due to respond to the recommendations for compulsory traffic light labelling later this year. Obesity Policy Coalition spokeswoman Jane Martin says the system has been shown to improve people's eating habits. "We believe if traffic lights were mandatory on all packaged foods it would guide and empower consumers to make healthier choices for themselves and their families - that's certainly what the evidence shows," she said. "It has been used in a voluntary capacity in the UK. For a category like ready meals with the traffic lights, sales of the healthy ready meals went up and sales of the unhealthy ready meals went down. "Our research shows consumers want to know how much salt, sugar, saturated fat and total fat, is in the products they buy. "Traffic light labels provide this information at a glance, and help shoppers sort the fat from the fiction." Melanie McGrice from the Dietitians Association of Australia says there should be mandatory front-of-pack food labelling that covers all food products. But she says legislation, as well as the Traffic Light Food Tracker, needs to show both the nutritional benefits and unhealthy content of each food item".

Of course it may take some time before such innovative applications become practical but the cell phone manufacturers can be expected to push such developments as they have great potential to increase their business. Of course if and when the food industry is forced to adopt the traffic light system as an industry standard, the cell phone application may become redundant. Traffic light system for evaluating food products may not be perfect since they are based on criteria like calories, sugar, fat and sodium as has been pointed out by its critics who feel that a product like Coca Cola with no sodium, fat and low calories is graded as green though every one knows the damage soft drinks can do to health. Still with proper checks and balances this system can still be of great help to the unwary consumers.

V.H.POTTY
http://vhpotty.blogspot.com/
http://foodtechupdates.blogspot.com