Northern Foods and Thorntons Added to UK List of 'Products Free of Colours Associated with Hyperactivity

The product lines added to the list are Fox's biscuit products, manufactured by Northern Foods, and Thorntons products, manufactured by Thorntons plc.

02/06/09 The Agency has updated its list of product ranges that do not contain the six food colours associated with possible hyperactivity in young children. A further two manufacturers producing product lines free of the colours have been added to the list.

The list includes both companies whose product ranges have never contained the six colours and product ranges that have been reformulated to remove the colours. The colours, identified by a Southampton University study financed by the Food Standards Agency, are:

* sunset yellow FCF (E110)
* quinoline yellow (E104)
* carmoisine (E122)
* allura red (E129)
* tartrazine (E102)
* ponceau 4R (E124)

The product lines added to the list are Fox's biscuit products, manufactured by Northern Foods, and Thorntons products, manufactured by Thorntons plc.

The Agency is publicising the product ranges to encourage the food industry to participate in the voluntary ban. The voluntary ban was agreed to by Ministers late last year.

Consumers who are particularly concerned about the presence of the colours should continue to check labels, especially in the case of products with a long shelf-life where the availability of reformulated products may vary.