The Scotsman

We’re cooking up a healthier Scotland by making a meal of nutritiona­l info

Simple, but effective, steps are being taken to tackle the scourge of rising obesity, writes David Thomson

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Ov er christmas families take a well-deserved break and get together to celebrate and enjoy the best that Scotland’s food and drink sector has to offer. Then the New Year hits and most of us start thinking about exercising and eating more healthily. But there are so many confusing messages in the media on fad diets and health scares which are not helpful. In fact, Food standards scotland’ s consumer Tracking Survey from September of last year found that 71 per cent of people thought experts contradict each other over which foods are good or bad for you and 34 per cent said they get confused over what’s supposed to be healthy and what isn’t.

FDF Scotland and our members take the health of the Scottish people very seriously, particular­ly in relation to rising obesity levels. Obesity is a complicate­d issue and there is no easy solution. Food and drink companies want to be part of the solution and are working with government and other stakeholde­rs to limit portion sizes, reformulat­e products and educate consumers about the food they are eating.

Educating consumers is a key way we can help improve the health of the nation. Rather than telling people what to eat and not to eat, we can arm them with the knowledge they need to make their own choices. For well over a decade UK food manufactur­ers have led the world in providing nutrition informatio­n on pack. Food and drink companies have a legal obligation to tell their customers what is in their food, and ingredient­s lists and nutrition informatio­n are both clearly provided on pack. However, many go much further by providing a simplified version of nutrition informatio­n on the front of pack, sometimes with red, amber and green colour coding. This means consumers can easily check, compare and choose foods based on their nutritiona­l characteri­stics.

FDF has created resources to help people understand food labels. This includes a booklet for healthcare profession­als to enable them to help their patients use food labels with confidence. The booklet has been downloaded more than 25,000 times and 12,000 hard copies were given away for free. Building on this work, we launched a labelling website for consumers which receives approximat­ely 11,400 hits a month.

There was a demand from education profession­als for a similar resource that could be used in the classroom. So as part of our schools work in Scotland – A Future in Food – we launched a new toolkit that can be used to teach students to read ingredient­s lists and understand nutrition informatio­n. This resource could have a much wider reach than just the classroom and be used by anyone who wants to better understand food labels.

Food education is an important way to help young people understand where their food comes from and how it is produced. A Future in Food, which is supported by the Scottish Government, does just that through active engagement with food and drink companies from across the supply chain. Teachers, pupils and parents also gain a better understand­ing of the wide variety of careers the industry has to offer and how to access jobs.

Part of this involves creating and supporting long-term partnershi­ps between schools and food and drink companies. For example, Angusbased seed potato company Agrico UK works with nearby Glamis and Eassie Primary Schools as part of the company’s award winning project,

0 Educating children to eat as healthily as possible includes checking ready meal Tattie Tastic. Primary 6-7 pupils take part in site visits at which they meet the staff, finding out what their different roles involve and learning all about potatoes and the journey they make from farm to fork. The pupils then have the chance to plant, grow, harvest and cook their own potatoes as well as designing and developing marketing campaigns.

In another example, Uncle Ben’s global initiative Ben’s Beginners aims to get children and families cooking together and having fun while developing a good relationsh­ip with food. In the UK this is delivered through a

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