“Misleading packaging”: Dutch consumer association calls for government intervention

31 Aug 2020 --- The Dutch government should ramp up efforts to tackle “misleading packaging” claims on food and beverage (F&B) products. This is according to Dutch lobby group Consumentenbond (Consumer Association), who is demanding that F&B producers ensure greater transparency and honesty in on-pack labeling so consumers can make fully informed purchasing decisions. Consumentenbond has called the government’s current approach to hindering misleading packaging as “mopping with a running faucet.”

According to the organization, the front-of-pack on F&B products is often ripe with “appealing logos, catchphrases and images” but does not depict a “correct presentation of the ingredients and nutritional value.” Its research has shown that products often reveal content information in fine print on the back of the product or “twisted” details.

“Many consumers base their choice for a product on the front,” explains Sandra Molenaar, Director of Consumentenbond. “And then you often end up disappointed.” 

She refers to fish imported from Southeast Asia and sold in Dutch supermarkets as “fresh fish,” cookies baked with “healthy ingredients” but containing significant amounts of sugar, butter and white flour as well as quark, or cottage cheese, being mixed with plain yogurt but sold as quark.

The Consumentenbond calls for the Dutch government to take “misleading packaging” claims on F&B packs more seriously.Scrutinizing the ingredient lists
Consumentenbond further questions the health profile of products incorporating vegetables in various F&B products, such as ice cream, breakfast cereals and pasta, often targeted at children. In its May coverage, our sister publication NutritionInsight found that UK baby food brands may be misleading parents to buy baby food products that are high in fruit sugars, but actually contain very little to no vegetables at all, despite focalizing both equally on front-of-pack.

“Deception with bait ingredients, sugar claims and improper use of terms such as ‘artisanal’ and ‘whole grain’ must be seriously countered. If there is an image of a healthy product, such as fruit, on a package, then it really has to be there [in the product at] a set minimum quantity. Now we need a really ambitious approach – preferably European, but the Netherlands can take the lead in this,” Molenaar maintains.

Across the EU, food industry giants, including Nestlé and Danone, have joined a coalition calling for the traffic light system Nutri-Score to become the mandatory front-of-pack nutrition labeling (FoPL) system. In the UK, a youth-driven movement named Bite Back 2030 called for the traffic light system to be compulsory on all foods in January. The campaign aims to align the UK with countries like Israel, which has just introduced laws making warning labels on all packaged products that are high in fat, salt and sugar compulsory.

In further packaging labeling coverage, PackagingInsights previously reported on research scrutinizing F&B claims that do not accurately describe nutritional integrity, as well as ethical lines in natural claims on-pack.

Edited by Anni Schleicher