Many every day healthy branded products from the UK's top supermarkets have unacceptable levels of salt and should not be called labelled healthy according to some leading experts.
Professor Graham MacGregor from St George's Hospital and chairman of CASH (Consensus Action on Salt and Health) is one of the world's leading experts in hypertension. He told Watchdog; "Some products high in salt claiming it is healthy is quite frankly ridiculous and it's a lie." Experts have told us that they are most concerned about foods that contain over 2g of salt per portion. It doesn't take long for the Watchdog team to find out that there is no shortage of those being sold in supermarkets and at high street restaurant and café chains.
So how much salt should we be eating? The Food Standard Agency recommends an adult should eat no more than 6 grams a day but in the UK, people consume on average 8.6 grams of salt. That's 3.1 kg of salt a year.
Too much salt over a long time increases blood pressure, which can lead to strokes and heart attacks - the biggest killer in the UK. Previous studies published in the British Medical Journal have predicted that reducing salt intake by 6 g/day will reduce the number of heart attacks and strokes by approximately 70,000 events (35,000 deaths) a year in the UK alone. Latest research shows that people who cut back on the amount of salt in their diet by about a third reduce their risk of developing a heart attack or a stroke by 25%.
Watchdog looked at over 80 products from the top four supermarkets (Asda, Sainsbury, Tesco and Morrisons) from their healthy range and found that many products contain two or more grams of salt per portion. One of the products we found with the highest salt content per portion was Morrisons' Eat Smart Sausage and Mash. While Morrisons claims their food in their healthy range meets strict criteria for the salt they contain, we identified it had 2.8g per portion, nearly half of the recommended daily allowance.
Despite Asda's claim that their Smoked Salmon Tagliatelle is 'Good for you' it contains 2.4g of salt. Asda say their Salmon is meant for two people, however, there was nothing written on their product that identified portion size.
Tesco Light choice Chicken and Broccoli pie - part of their Healthy Living range- was 2.4g per portion and Sainsbury's Mushroom and Bacon Tagliatelle came in at 2.12g per pack.
But even if you do try and chose a product that is low in salt it can become difficult and confusing. Tesco's Light Choice Prawn Mayo had 1.9 grams of salt; almost a third of the recommended daily allowance had more salt than their full fat Prawn Mayo sandwich from the same Tesco store.
But at least the labels on these products clearly list the salt content. Not all foods make this quite so obvious. Sometimes instead of salt, companies list sodium and there's a big difference. Sodium is a component of salt therefore listing the sodium on a product is going to make it look like it's got less than if you list the salt. To get your salt you have to multiply your sodium by 2.5. This can be confusing.
About three-quarters of the salt we eat is already in the food we buy, including processed foods such as ready meals, sauces and cereals. Even Jamie Oliver, a name we trust since he took on school dinners, had a surprising amount of salt in his pasta sauces. Watchdog found that in Jamie Oliver's Garlic, Olive and Tomato pasta sauce, it had 5.3 grams of salt in half a jar. Jaime Oliver says his sauces are so full of flavour it should be used sparingly but agrees that's not clear on the label.
Over the past several years supermarkets have been making an effort to reduce the salt in their name brands and clearly label products. But Watchdog found this was not the case for some leading restaurants and cafes claiming to be healthy.
High Street chain Pret a Manger's miso soup labelled as ridiculously healthy was ridiculously salty. In fact, it had more salt than a McDonald's Big Mac. Although miso soup tends to be salty, Watchdog found that Yo Sushi's miso soup had a lot less salt.
Popular Japanese restaurant Itsu sells a soup that is marketed as Dynamite Detox but it
contains a massive 4.24g of salt - nearly three quarters of the recommended daily allowance. That means it is incredibly, saltier than sea water.
Both Pret a Manger and Itsu have no nutritional information anywhere in their cafes and restaurants but they do provide information their websites. High Street restaurant chain, Wagamama doesn't display any nutritional information in the restaurant or on their website. . To find out what was in their Wagamama Ramen, Watchdog had it sent to a lab to get it tested. Wagamama's slogan is "positive eating, positive living" but there is nothing positive about the amount of salt in their Wagamama Ramen, there's one and a half times your daily allowance in just one bowl.
To find out what effects a diet sold as healthy would have, Watchdog's Anita Rani went on a special diet. For seven days Anita ate food from the big supermarkets described as Light Choice, Good for You, Be Good to Yourself and Eat Smart. Whilst these products might be low in calories or fat, if they really are healthy - eating food like this should mean after seven days there'll be much less salt in Anita's body. Watchdog sent Anita's urine to an independent lab at the beginning and again at the end of the seven day experiment to see the difference. The results were shocking. At the end of Anita's seven day diet of foods that are branded as healthy, her salt levels had trebled and that was just in one week.
Professor MacGregor from St George's Hospital believes the food industry can do more.
"Cutting salt is a simple way for people to reduce their risk of having a heart attack or a stroke. As eighty percent of our salt intake comes from salt already added by the food industry this research provides compelling evidence for why the food industry should lower the salt content of their products. If they do this they can help prevent thousands of unnecessary heart attacks and strokes from happening. With the accumulating evidence now available to us, and the fact that the majority of a person's salt intake comes from processed foods, every manufacturer now needs to act immediately to reduce the salt added to their foods."
It seems when some foods are sold or labeled as healthy, it's a claim you may want to take with a large pinch of salt.
Advice on reducing your salt intake.
The following companies responded to Watchdog's investigation.
Morrisons' statement:
"Morrisons aims to offer fresh food at great value for money, whilst helping our customers to live a healthy balanced lifestyle. We support the Food Standards Agency's strategy to reduce consumer intake of salt by increasing consumer awareness. Since 2006 we have been reducing the salt content of all Morrisons own brand products and continue to do so in order to meet the Food Standards Agency's targets in 2010."
ASDA's statement:
"This is a dish meant for two people and 1.2grams of salt per person is perfectly reasonable. It's within both the Food Standards Agency guidelines as well as the British Dietetic Association. In January 2008 we were the first supermarket to meet the FSA's salt reduction targets set for 2010, two years ahead of deadline and we continue to remove salt wherever possible. Last year alone we removed 83 tonnes of salt from Asda products.
Good For you products are aimed at people who want to try and lose weight and the criteria for Good For You products is based on fat and calorie content. We are also the only supermarket to use both traffic light labelling and GDA guidelines on the front of our packaging, as recommended by the FSA so it couldn't be more clear to our customers what's in the food they are buying from Asda!
Tesco's statement:
"Reducing salt, sugar and saturated fat is an important part of a healthy diet. We have been cutting levels across our ranges since 2005, without compromising on flavour.
Tesco has removed over 3,000 tonnes of salt from products in the UK since 2005, including 145 tonnes from our ready meals, and this is an on-going process. The average Tesco ready meal already contains 10% less salt than the 2010 target set by the Food Standards Agency.
"All of our products carry clear front-of-pack labelling and this includes guidance daily amounts (GDAs) on salt, helping customers make an informed decision on the products they consume and helps them eat a healthy and balanced diet."
Cauldron statement:
We are constantly looking for ways to meet people's demand for delicious meat-free foods which can be part of a healthy, balanced diet.
To that end we have developed organic marinated tofu pieces which are significantly lower in salt than the current product and we plan to launch this as a replacement for the existing product shortly.
At Cauldron we don't use any artificial flavours, colours or preservatives and we don't use genetically modified ingredients. Many of our products are organic and certified by the Soil Association.
It's worth noting that our Organic tofu has only a trace amount of salt whilst our organic beach smoked tofu contains 1g of salt per 100g (0.75g salt per serving).
Jamie Oliver statement:
"The Olive, Garlic & Tomato pasta sauce we identified will be one of the first sauces on shelves with a reduced salt content and should be available in supermarkets this autumn / this side of Christmas.
The main reason for the high salt content is that some of the ingredients, notably the olives, will have been stored in brine before going into the sauce. However, these particular sauces have been developed to be so full of flavour that a little goes a long way. In Italy, a tomato sauce like this would be used sparingly, almost like a dressing on pasta or as a pizza topping, so a whole jar should easily be enough for 4-6 people, in this way sharing out the salt and lowering each individual's intake. Admittedly the labeling is unclear and we are changing this so that the consumer knows that a jar is intended to serve 4 people.
Jamie and his team have been working over the summer on finding ways to reduce the salt content while keeping the great flavour and as a result of this work, some new, lower salt recipes are now in production and will be begin to be sold into supermarkets from late October to be on shelves as soon as possible. The labeling will also be clarified so that people can see that a jar can serve 4 people at least."
Wagamama's statement:
"For the last six months, following conversations with Consensus Action on Salt and Health (cash), Wagamama has been working closely with the British Nutrition Foundation (bnf) to reduce salt in our meals
We are aware of the salt content in our dishes, which have been extensively and independently assessed. we would like to reassure watchdog's viewers that we had already started work on reformulating dishes, including ramens, to reduce salt content
Our first priority was to reduce the salt content in our children's meals, which we have successfully done in all our restaurants
We have also reduced the salt content of our adult ramen dishes in three of our restaurants to gauge customer reaction and feedback. Following this we expect to make these changes in all our restaurants
We are continuing to work with the BNF to implement further salt reductions across the menu as a whole.
We remain committed to ensuring our customers' have a positive experience of our food and restaurants.
Steve Hill, CEO, Wagamama comments: "we are aware of the salt content in our dishes. Wagamama has been working closely with the British Nutrition Foundation, for the past six months, to significantly reduce salt in meals. This is currently being trialled in a number of restaurants and I expect it to be rolled out to all restaurants very soon".
Pret A Manger's statement:
"We carefully monitor all our ingredients. We work on the basis that most adults eat three meals a day. For that reason, we feel this level is not excessive, but we always listen to any concerns carefully. We care what our customers think and will always try to accommodate their views. No salt is added at all to our miso soup. The salt occurs completely naturally in the soy beans, the seaweed, the soy sauce and the fish sauce. Our miso soup is made to an authentic Japanese recipe. We're always interested in ways we can make our food healthier, as well as more delicious. All our sandwiches, baguettes and wraps already comply with the FSA's 2010 salt guidelines and this will continue to be an important focus for us. We hope to move to a low sodium soya later this year - which will reduce the salt content in our miso soup. There are definitely choices which are less healthy e.g. Deep fried food that use trans-fats for instance. These days some people are even skipping lunch to save money. In the scheme of things, our miso soup is low in fat and has only natural ingredients. It has few calories and no saturated fat and contains no carbohydrates and no MSG. Using these common criteria and the comparables, we maintain it is very healthy - and eating one third of the recommended daily salt allowance at one of the three meals a day, does not seem excessive."
Itsu's statement:
"Itsu food is very low in fats, low in calories and packed full of nutrients. You're right, miso soup is high in salt....it's also considered by nutritionists the world over as a very nutritious dish to eat. Creating delicious healthy food is an ongoing journey and a challenge! We are aware of our salt challenge, largely attributed to miso soup and soy sauce. We will continue to make changes, lowering our salt levels to well within the RDA guidelines by the end of 2009. By the time your programme is aired, we will have changed all the soy sauce used in our 'Dynamite Soup' to low salt soy sauce, reducing the salt content by up to 43%, also reducing the quantities used.
We were planning to do this, but congratulations to Watchdog for speeding this up....there's nothing like a kick in the butt to get things done.
Already in 2009 (August), we reduced the soy sauce quantities provided in our sushi boxes by 30% and tweaked other ingredients to ensure the broth is every bit as delicious as it previously was. So some big steps forward for this product. If your programme is about food, then you'll know that obesity is rare in Japan (less than 3%), and as a race they live longer than any other. This is primarily due to their good diet of which soy/miso is a major part.
Salt's not great, but high saturated fat is even worse, and worse still are all the endless chemicals and additives used in contemporary, prepared food!
</strong>Food Standards Agency statement:
Since 2004 the Food Standards Agency has been actively working to reduce the amount of salt in the nation's diet. We've been working with the food industry to get them to take salt seriously - encouraging manufacturers to reformulate and reduce salt in those foods that contribute the most.
Much has been achieved with significant salt reductions, for example the levels in wrapped sliced bread have reduced by around 30% and in breakfast cereals by 44%. Alongside this, our awareness campaigns have helped achieve a ten-fold increase in people's knowledge of the 'no more than 6g a day' message and this has been backed by the widespread use across all the major retailers of front-of-pack nutrition labelling - making it easier for shoppers to choose healthier options.
The most recent survey in early 2008 showed that salt intakes are coming down and we have achieved a reduction of almost a gram in average daily salt intakes. This reduction has so far prevented around 6,000 premature deaths and saved the economy about £1.5 billion.
Seventy-five per cent of the salt we eat is already in processed everyday foods. In some food categories there remain wide variations in salt levels, which is why it's so important to check the labels. But to reach our goal of 6g, more needs to be done and we are continuing to press industry to make further reductions which is why further tougher salt targets were recently set for 2012.
Not all labels do provide information on salt; some give the amount in sodium. Food labelling regulations are set at an EU level. We recognise that not having a standardised way of labelling salt is not helpful and we are currently lobbying at the EU to change this. The Agency is also pushing forward in getting a single front-of-pack nutrition labelling scheme to be adopted across UK industry.
Of course tackling the salt used in the catering sector is also key as around 1 in 6 meals are eaten out of home. The Agency has been working to secure commitments on healthier catering, including salt reduction, from the UK's largest companies. To date more than 40 companies, including many of the big high street chains, have published their healthier eating commitments on the Agency's website. We have also been working with 21 companies to trial calorie labelling on menus and will be rolling this out more widely shortly. This is the first step and we will also be looking at what other information could usefully be provided on menus. For more information on our catering programme click here.
If we are to achieve our goal of improving public health it is vital that consumers get into the habit of checking labels and choosing the lower salt options. The biggest driver to getting food manufacturers to reduce salt is consumer demand - industry will produce what people want to buy. It's essential people become more salt savvy. For more information see our salt website
Are we eating too much salt? Leave your comments below.
Are we eating too much salt?
Professor Graham MacGregor from St George's Hospital and chairman of CASH (Consensus Action on Salt and Health) is one of the world's leading experts in hypertension. He told Watchdog; "Some products high in salt claiming it is healthy is quite frankly ridiculous and it's a lie." Experts have told us that they are most concerned about foods that contain over 2g of salt per portion. It doesn't take long for the Watchdog team to find out that there is no shortage of those being sold in supermarkets and at high street restaurant and café chains.
So how much salt should we be eating? The Food Standard Agency recommends an adult should eat no more than 6 grams a day but in the UK, people consume on average 8.6 grams of salt. That's 3.1 kg of salt a year.
Too much salt over a long time increases blood pressure, which can lead to strokes and heart attacks - the biggest killer in the UK. Previous studies published in the British Medical Journal have predicted that reducing salt intake by 6 g/day will reduce the number of heart attacks and strokes by approximately 70,000 events (35,000 deaths) a year in the UK alone. Latest research shows that people who cut back on the amount of salt in their diet by about a third reduce their risk of developing a heart attack or a stroke by 25%.
Watchdog looked at over 80 products from the top four supermarkets (Asda, Sainsbury, Tesco and Morrisons) from their healthy range and found that many products contain two or more grams of salt per portion. One of the products we found with the highest salt content per portion was Morrisons' Eat Smart Sausage and Mash. While Morrisons claims their food in their healthy range meets strict criteria for the salt they contain, we identified it had 2.8g per portion, nearly half of the recommended daily allowance.
Despite Asda's claim that their Smoked Salmon Tagliatelle is 'Good for you' it contains 2.4g of salt. Asda say their Salmon is meant for two people, however, there was nothing written on their product that identified portion size.
Tesco Light choice Chicken and Broccoli pie - part of their Healthy Living range- was 2.4g per portion and Sainsbury's Mushroom and Bacon Tagliatelle came in at 2.12g per pack.
But even if you do try and chose a product that is low in salt it can become difficult and confusing. Tesco's Light Choice Prawn Mayo had 1.9 grams of salt; almost a third of the recommended daily allowance had more salt than their full fat Prawn Mayo sandwich from the same Tesco store.
But at least the labels on these products clearly list the salt content. Not all foods make this quite so obvious. Sometimes instead of salt, companies list sodium and there's a big difference. Sodium is a component of salt therefore listing the sodium on a product is going to make it look like it's got less than if you list the salt. To get your salt you have to multiply your sodium by 2.5. This can be confusing.
About three-quarters of the salt we eat is already in the food we buy, including processed foods such as ready meals, sauces and cereals. Even Jamie Oliver, a name we trust since he took on school dinners, had a surprising amount of salt in his pasta sauces. Watchdog found that in Jamie Oliver's Garlic, Olive and Tomato pasta sauce, it had 5.3 grams of salt in half a jar. Jaime Oliver says his sauces are so full of flavour it should be used sparingly but agrees that's not clear on the label.
Over the past several years supermarkets have been making an effort to reduce the salt in their name brands and clearly label products. But Watchdog found this was not the case for some leading restaurants and cafes claiming to be healthy.
High Street chain Pret a Manger's miso soup labelled as ridiculously healthy was ridiculously salty. In fact, it had more salt than a McDonald's Big Mac. Although miso soup tends to be salty, Watchdog found that Yo Sushi's miso soup had a lot less salt.
Popular Japanese restaurant Itsu sells a soup that is marketed as Dynamite Detox but it
contains a massive 4.24g of salt - nearly three quarters of the recommended daily allowance. That means it is incredibly, saltier than sea water.
Both Pret a Manger and Itsu have no nutritional information anywhere in their cafes and restaurants but they do provide information their websites. High Street restaurant chain, Wagamama doesn't display any nutritional information in the restaurant or on their website. . To find out what was in their Wagamama Ramen, Watchdog had it sent to a lab to get it tested. Wagamama's slogan is "positive eating, positive living" but there is nothing positive about the amount of salt in their Wagamama Ramen, there's one and a half times your daily allowance in just one bowl.
To find out what effects a diet sold as healthy would have, Watchdog's Anita Rani went on a special diet. For seven days Anita ate food from the big supermarkets described as Light Choice, Good for You, Be Good to Yourself and Eat Smart. Whilst these products might be low in calories or fat, if they really are healthy - eating food like this should mean after seven days there'll be much less salt in Anita's body. Watchdog sent Anita's urine to an independent lab at the beginning and again at the end of the seven day experiment to see the difference. The results were shocking. At the end of Anita's seven day diet of foods that are branded as healthy, her salt levels had trebled and that was just in one week.
Professor MacGregor from St George's Hospital believes the food industry can do more.
"Cutting salt is a simple way for people to reduce their risk of having a heart attack or a stroke. As eighty percent of our salt intake comes from salt already added by the food industry this research provides compelling evidence for why the food industry should lower the salt content of their products. If they do this they can help prevent thousands of unnecessary heart attacks and strokes from happening. With the accumulating evidence now available to us, and the fact that the majority of a person's salt intake comes from processed foods, every manufacturer now needs to act immediately to reduce the salt added to their foods."
It seems when some foods are sold or labeled as healthy, it's a claim you may want to take with a large pinch of salt.
Advice on reducing your salt intake.
The following companies responded to Watchdog's investigation.
Morrisons' statement:
"Morrisons aims to offer fresh food at great value for money, whilst helping our customers to live a healthy balanced lifestyle. We support the Food Standards Agency's strategy to reduce consumer intake of salt by increasing consumer awareness. Since 2006 we have been reducing the salt content of all Morrisons own brand products and continue to do so in order to meet the Food Standards Agency's targets in 2010."
ASDA's statement:
"This is a dish meant for two people and 1.2grams of salt per person is perfectly reasonable. It's within both the Food Standards Agency guidelines as well as the British Dietetic Association. In January 2008 we were the first supermarket to meet the FSA's salt reduction targets set for 2010, two years ahead of deadline and we continue to remove salt wherever possible. Last year alone we removed 83 tonnes of salt from Asda products.
Good For you products are aimed at people who want to try and lose weight and the criteria for Good For You products is based on fat and calorie content. We are also the only supermarket to use both traffic light labelling and GDA guidelines on the front of our packaging, as recommended by the FSA so it couldn't be more clear to our customers what's in the food they are buying from Asda!
Tesco's statement:
"Reducing salt, sugar and saturated fat is an important part of a healthy diet. We have been cutting levels across our ranges since 2005, without compromising on flavour.
Tesco has removed over 3,000 tonnes of salt from products in the UK since 2005, including 145 tonnes from our ready meals, and this is an on-going process. The average Tesco ready meal already contains 10% less salt than the 2010 target set by the Food Standards Agency.
"All of our products carry clear front-of-pack labelling and this includes guidance daily amounts (GDAs) on salt, helping customers make an informed decision on the products they consume and helps them eat a healthy and balanced diet."
Cauldron statement:
We are constantly looking for ways to meet people's demand for delicious meat-free foods which can be part of a healthy, balanced diet.
To that end we have developed organic marinated tofu pieces which are significantly lower in salt than the current product and we plan to launch this as a replacement for the existing product shortly.
At Cauldron we don't use any artificial flavours, colours or preservatives and we don't use genetically modified ingredients. Many of our products are organic and certified by the Soil Association.
It's worth noting that our Organic tofu has only a trace amount of salt whilst our organic beach smoked tofu contains 1g of salt per 100g (0.75g salt per serving).
Jamie Oliver statement:
"The Olive, Garlic & Tomato pasta sauce we identified will be one of the first sauces on shelves with a reduced salt content and should be available in supermarkets this autumn / this side of Christmas.
The main reason for the high salt content is that some of the ingredients, notably the olives, will have been stored in brine before going into the sauce. However, these particular sauces have been developed to be so full of flavour that a little goes a long way. In Italy, a tomato sauce like this would be used sparingly, almost like a dressing on pasta or as a pizza topping, so a whole jar should easily be enough for 4-6 people, in this way sharing out the salt and lowering each individual's intake. Admittedly the labeling is unclear and we are changing this so that the consumer knows that a jar is intended to serve 4 people.
Jamie and his team have been working over the summer on finding ways to reduce the salt content while keeping the great flavour and as a result of this work, some new, lower salt recipes are now in production and will be begin to be sold into supermarkets from late October to be on shelves as soon as possible. The labeling will also be clarified so that people can see that a jar can serve 4 people at least."
Wagamama's statement:
"For the last six months, following conversations with Consensus Action on Salt and Health (cash), Wagamama has been working closely with the British Nutrition Foundation (bnf) to reduce salt in our meals
We are aware of the salt content in our dishes, which have been extensively and independently assessed. we would like to reassure watchdog's viewers that we had already started work on reformulating dishes, including ramens, to reduce salt content
Our first priority was to reduce the salt content in our children's meals, which we have successfully done in all our restaurants
We have also reduced the salt content of our adult ramen dishes in three of our restaurants to gauge customer reaction and feedback. Following this we expect to make these changes in all our restaurants
We are continuing to work with the BNF to implement further salt reductions across the menu as a whole.
We remain committed to ensuring our customers' have a positive experience of our food and restaurants.
Steve Hill, CEO, Wagamama comments: "we are aware of the salt content in our dishes. Wagamama has been working closely with the British Nutrition Foundation, for the past six months, to significantly reduce salt in meals. This is currently being trialled in a number of restaurants and I expect it to be rolled out to all restaurants very soon".
Pret A Manger's statement:
"We carefully monitor all our ingredients. We work on the basis that most adults eat three meals a day. For that reason, we feel this level is not excessive, but we always listen to any concerns carefully. We care what our customers think and will always try to accommodate their views. No salt is added at all to our miso soup. The salt occurs completely naturally in the soy beans, the seaweed, the soy sauce and the fish sauce. Our miso soup is made to an authentic Japanese recipe. We're always interested in ways we can make our food healthier, as well as more delicious. All our sandwiches, baguettes and wraps already comply with the FSA's 2010 salt guidelines and this will continue to be an important focus for us. We hope to move to a low sodium soya later this year - which will reduce the salt content in our miso soup. There are definitely choices which are less healthy e.g. Deep fried food that use trans-fats for instance. These days some people are even skipping lunch to save money. In the scheme of things, our miso soup is low in fat and has only natural ingredients. It has few calories and no saturated fat and contains no carbohydrates and no MSG. Using these common criteria and the comparables, we maintain it is very healthy - and eating one third of the recommended daily salt allowance at one of the three meals a day, does not seem excessive."
Itsu's statement:
"Itsu food is very low in fats, low in calories and packed full of nutrients. You're right, miso soup is high in salt....it's also considered by nutritionists the world over as a very nutritious dish to eat. Creating delicious healthy food is an ongoing journey and a challenge! We are aware of our salt challenge, largely attributed to miso soup and soy sauce. We will continue to make changes, lowering our salt levels to well within the RDA guidelines by the end of 2009. By the time your programme is aired, we will have changed all the soy sauce used in our 'Dynamite Soup' to low salt soy sauce, reducing the salt content by up to 43%, also reducing the quantities used.
We were planning to do this, but congratulations to Watchdog for speeding this up....there's nothing like a kick in the butt to get things done.
Already in 2009 (August), we reduced the soy sauce quantities provided in our sushi boxes by 30% and tweaked other ingredients to ensure the broth is every bit as delicious as it previously was. So some big steps forward for this product. If your programme is about food, then you'll know that obesity is rare in Japan (less than 3%), and as a race they live longer than any other. This is primarily due to their good diet of which soy/miso is a major part.
Salt's not great, but high saturated fat is even worse, and worse still are all the endless chemicals and additives used in contemporary, prepared food!
</strong>Food Standards Agency statement:
Since 2004 the Food Standards Agency has been actively working to reduce the amount of salt in the nation's diet. We've been working with the food industry to get them to take salt seriously - encouraging manufacturers to reformulate and reduce salt in those foods that contribute the most.
Much has been achieved with significant salt reductions, for example the levels in wrapped sliced bread have reduced by around 30% and in breakfast cereals by 44%. Alongside this, our awareness campaigns have helped achieve a ten-fold increase in people's knowledge of the 'no more than 6g a day' message and this has been backed by the widespread use across all the major retailers of front-of-pack nutrition labelling - making it easier for shoppers to choose healthier options.
The most recent survey in early 2008 showed that salt intakes are coming down and we have achieved a reduction of almost a gram in average daily salt intakes. This reduction has so far prevented around 6,000 premature deaths and saved the economy about £1.5 billion.
Seventy-five per cent of the salt we eat is already in processed everyday foods. In some food categories there remain wide variations in salt levels, which is why it's so important to check the labels. But to reach our goal of 6g, more needs to be done and we are continuing to press industry to make further reductions which is why further tougher salt targets were recently set for 2012.
Not all labels do provide information on salt; some give the amount in sodium. Food labelling regulations are set at an EU level. We recognise that not having a standardised way of labelling salt is not helpful and we are currently lobbying at the EU to change this. The Agency is also pushing forward in getting a single front-of-pack nutrition labelling scheme to be adopted across UK industry.
Of course tackling the salt used in the catering sector is also key as around 1 in 6 meals are eaten out of home. The Agency has been working to secure commitments on healthier catering, including salt reduction, from the UK's largest companies. To date more than 40 companies, including many of the big high street chains, have published their healthier eating commitments on the Agency's website. We have also been working with 21 companies to trial calorie labelling on menus and will be rolling this out more widely shortly. This is the first step and we will also be looking at what other information could usefully be provided on menus. For more information on our catering programme click here.
If we are to achieve our goal of improving public health it is vital that consumers get into the habit of checking labels and choosing the lower salt options. The biggest driver to getting food manufacturers to reduce salt is consumer demand - industry will produce what people want to buy. It's essential people become more salt savvy. For more information see our salt website
Are we eating too much salt? Leave your comments below.
Are we eating too much salt?