- Gaps in EU rules leave room for misleading food labels.
- Consumers can get lost in a maze of constantly changing labels.
- Fines are not always enough to prevent abuses.
Consumers can easily get lost in a maze of food labels, EU auditors warn in a report published today. Food labelling should help people to make informed decisions when buying food. But European consumers are exposed to a growing number of claims, logos, slogans, labels and scores which can be not only confusing but also misleading.
Labels provide information about the content and properties of food. They are also often used to make products more attractive by emphasising supposed benefits, such as being healthy, organic, or gluten-free. EU rules ensure that labels provide consumers with basic information, which is certainly a helpful place to start. But the auditors found a number of worrying gaps in the legislation, as well as problems with checks and penalties.
“Instead of bringing clarity, food labels too often create confusion; there are hundreds of different schemes, logos and claims that people need to decipher”, said Keit Pentus-Rosimannus, the member of the European Court of Auditors responsible for the audit. “Companies can be very creative in what they put on packaging, and EU rules have not caught up with a constantly evolving market, leaving some 450 million European consumers vulnerable to intentionally or unintentionally misleading messages.”
The fact is that weak EU legislation can lead to consumers being fooled. For instance, EU rules allow for the use of nutrition and health claims even for products that are high in fat, sugar and/or salt, meaning that sugary products, such as energy bars, may be advertised as ‘high in protein’. Similarly, consumers are increasingly exposed to non-regulated health claims about plant substances or “botanicals” (such as ‘contributes to energy recovery’ or ‘improves physical performance’), even when this is not supported by scientific evidence.
Some consumers may even feel aggrieved. People with food allergies may be faced with over-cautious allergen labelling and vague statements such as ‘may contain’. In practice, this restricts their choice of products. Vegetarians and vegans are particularly affected: the use of vegan and vegetarian labelling is not regulated, as there is no EU-wide definition of such products.
Front-of-pack nutrition labelling such as Nutri-Score, the NutrInform Battery, and Keyhole are not harmonised at EU level, and no consensus exists among European stakeholders about which labelling system to use. However, standardised rules could help consumers to identify healthier food options, and potentially prevent diet-related diseases. Instead, the co-existence of multiple schemes in EU countries – each with different meanings and purposes – has quite the opposite effect, i.e. confusing rather than guiding consumers.
The confusion is made worse by the increasing number of voluntary labels, logos and claims that are used to attract consumers. These include ‘clean’ labels about the absence of certain elements (e.g. ‘antibiotic-free’) and uncertified qualities (e.g. ‘fresh’ and ‘natural’), but also a wide range of environmental claims which are tantamount to greenwashing. Current EU rules are regrettably unable to prevent such practices, note the auditors.
Notwithstanding these criticisms, the auditors found that educating consumers does not appear to be a priority. The EU allocated only around €5.5million to food-labelling awareness campaigns from 2021 to 2025, and consumer campaigns by member states are sporadic. For instance, date marking – although mandatory – is poorly understood, with consumers confused by the meaning and implications of ‘use by’ and ‘best before’.
Food companies can also take advantage of weaknesses in checks and penalties. Checks generally work well for mandatory elements of food labelling. By contrast, there are few or no checks as regards voluntary information – such as nutrition and health claims – or online food sales (which have boomed since the pandemic), where websites outside the EU are almost impossible to check. In the case of infringements, the EU auditors conclude that fines are not always dissuasive, effective or proportionate.
Background information
In the EU, the provision of food information for consumers is regulated by a set of general rules, such as the 2002 General Food Law Regulation, the 2006 Claims Regulation, and the 2011 Food Information to Consumers Regulation (FIC Regulation). Food labelling in the EU is also regulated by a series of more targeted rules that set requirements for specific food products (e.g. wine, eggs, honey, olive oil, and food intended for young children).
The EU definition of a label is “any tag, brand, mark, pictorial or other descriptive matter, written, printed, stencilled, marked, embossed or impressed on, or attached to the packaging or container of food”.