05/09/07 Checking the Label

Yesterday we talked with Sarah Colby a nutritionist with USDA's Agricultural Research Service who has recently completed a study of packaged foods at your local grocery store aimed at the kid audience. She found that a high number of these products with packaging designed to attract our kids' attention also used nutritional information as a key marketing tactic. COLBY: Parents are going into the grocery store and if they are being influenced to purchase products because of health information on the front of the label and they want to make the healthiest choice they can for their kids  they may be grabbing foods based on that one claim on the front or the one piece of information or the one piece of marketing without looking at the overall composition and so they may still be getting foods that are high in sugar or high in saturated fat or sodium that are not necessarily the choice they would make if they looked at all the information. But Colby stresses that it's important to turn the package over and look at the nutritional label. COLBY: Don't be influenced by what you see on the front of a label only, really think about the whole product, take the time to read the nutrition facts panel and make an informed choice. This research came out of a specific incident in Colby's life. COLBY: I have two small children and my little one came running up in the grocery store and said oh mom we've got to grab this, we've got to grab this and was holding a can of something that had a big character on the front of it that he loved jumping out and all excited - and I happened to know the saturated fat and sodium content of this food and so I said no honey we're not going to get that and my older son that could read said oh, but mom you've got to get this; it's a good source of protein and sure enough there was a bubble coming out of the characters mouth saying "good source of protein." The incident was not unique since we as parents have to deal with that sort of thing everyday when we have small children but as a researcher and nutritionist it got Colby to thinking. COLBY: But I wondered if other mom's who don't have the nutrition background that I do if they would grab that product thinking "oh I need to get this to help my child be healthy because it's a good source of protein" without having the opportunity to know that if they looked at that nutrition facts panel they'd see it's also high in saturated fat and it's also high in sodium and they might want to think about how that's going to fit into their child's diet. That's today's Line On Agriculture. I'm Greg Martin on the Northwest Ag Information Network. Nutrition Facts Panel link - http://www.cfsan.fda.gov/~dms/foodlab.html