Food use-by dates seen as most critical

OVER ONE-QUARTER of consumers never read food labels but, for those who do, information on nutrition and calorie content is of increasing importance, according to a new survey.

Nearly three-quarters of those surveyed for the Food Safety Authority of Ireland (FSAI) considered existing food labelling to be informative, and a majority believes information about sell-by dates and country of origin should be compulsory.

Some 27 per cent of consumers said they always read labels when shopping for food, up from 8 per cent when a similar survey was conducted in 2002.

Asked to rate the importance of information legally required on food labels, consumers ranked the use-by/best-before date as most important, followed by the ingredients list and the name of the food.

The vast majority of consumers considered the nutrition table on a label to be very or fairly important, but most would prefer to see nutrient values stated per portion (eg, per bowl), than per 100g or 100ml.

Over 70 per cent of consumers surveyed said they were very or fairly concerned about salt in food. Currently, the salt content of a food is declared as “sodium”, but the majority of consumers said they would prefer to see a “salt” value on the label instead.

More than 80 per cent wanted health advice on the consumption of alcohol labelled on such products.