Food composition & the internal market - A cross-country comparison exercise by BEUC members

To make the healthy choice the easy choice, high-quality nutritious food and drink should become the rule, not the exception. Food companies across the EU have committed to reformulate their products to improve people’s diet.

However it is not clear when and why companies sell different or identical food and drink, nutrition wise, to different countries.

17 BEUC members have carried out a small-scale shopping exercise looking into food businesses practices by checking the nutrition composition of 9 everyday food and drink products.

BEUC calls for more transparency to understand the reasons underpinning food companies’ reformulation policies. It will help provide a comprehensive overview of reformulation efforts and identify opportunities to offer consumers healthier food products across the whole EU. At the same time governments must monitor voluntary initiatives and drive the appropriate changes to ensure that reduction targets for salt, added sugars and saturated fat are met.