Traffic light labelling system’s classification for food
Great Britain is the fourth international market for Italian food companies which sell their products abroad. This means business and export opportunities for € 2.500.000.000, as Italy’s food and drink industry body Federalimentare points out. As we can easily understand, Italian farmers were very disappointed when Great Britain Department of Health annonced a new project: using traffic light labelling for food products.
HOW DOES THIS SYSTEM WORK?
Helping customers to distinguish bad food from healthy food and fighting fatness problems: these are the main purposes declared by English Minister Mrs Anna Soubry one year ago. Each food item is labelled red, yellow or green depending on its fats, salt and sugar contents for a 100 grammes quantity.
WHAT DOES IT MEAN FOR “MADE IN ITALY” FOOD?
Italian exportation for food were damaged by this decision because traffic light labelling system is too summary. It doesn’t take into consideration neither quantities that are consumed nor other nutritional components. In a very simple way, labels communicate that an item is not absolutely healthy and this is wrong. The right information is that the item marked “red” must be consumed with moderation.
Traditional Italian products for which “Made in Italy” is a worldwide brand, such as olive oil and Parmesan cheese, were classified as “bad food” while cola is marked “green” and we know it is not healthier than cheese.Market research points out that 67% of English customers don’t buy a product labelled “red” because this colour means “warning, danger” and so both import and export to Italy for food products are decreasing. In addition, Great Britain is not a Country renowned for light food or balanced diet and so if English Minister Mrs Anna Soubry thinks a label may solve fatness problems she is off the truck.
A traditional “Made in Italy” food: Parmesan cheese
These are the reason why Italy decided to present this problem to EU Commission.
In particular, Italian EU Parliament members point out that labels are misleading and they don’t really help customers choosing healthy food as Great Britain claimed. On the contrary, customers are not responsible for their choices, they only look at the colour without analyzing the other components. It’s an easy and fast system but it is not realistic: if items marked as “red” were harmul for public health they would have been removed from both Great Britain and all international markets. As declaired by Paolo De Castro, Head of the European parliament’s agriculture committee, this system risks to damage quality products such as Italian ones.
WHICH IS EU COMMISSION’S DECISION ABOUT THIS SYSTEM?
Few days ago, Italy received an important confirmation: EU Commission decided to send a “letter of formal notice” to Great Britain, which has 2 months to answer. In case of no solution or no answer, Italian “dossier” will be submitted to EU Court. EU Commission confirms customers need information when choosing products but this is not the right method.
This success for Italy is justified by:
- combined actions coming from all Italian EU Parliament and Commission members during this months
- combined actions coming from Italian farmers, Federalimentari and other Italian Organizations
- Italian Prime Minister Mr Matteo Renzi’s commitment to solve this situation
- EU treaties’ rules
Concerning the last point, EU treaties allows free exchanges between European Union Countries. Each item which is produced and selled by an EU Country following its rules and its standard, legal and traditional procedures can be commercialized in other EU Countries. As a consequence, all EU members have to accept distribution and commercialization for EU products into their markets. Thanks to these rules, the whole Europe is a market without customs or restrictions. On account of this, traffic light labelling system is a clear discrimination against some products and this is not allowed.
Import to Italy, export companies and “Made in Italy” won this battle and this is a great success for the whole sector.
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