Food Labels in Chile

In 2016, Chilean government passed a law, over the vehement objections of the food processing industry, that banned ads directed at children if those products exceeded standards for calories, fat, sugar, and sodium. Unhealthy products carry warning signs: “High in Calories,” “High in Saturated Fat,” and “High in Sodium.” The Washington Post notes that if Lunchables were sold in Chile, they would have to carry warning labels for high calories, high saturated fat, and high in sodium, based on analysis from researchers at the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill and Diego Portales University in Chile.

Could the United States impose such labels, right on the front of the package? In the Spring of 2023, the US Department of Health and Human Services proposed Front-of-Package Nutrition Labelling, but the proposal ran into strong objections from the Food Industry Association, which warned that such labeling would run into First Amendment and other legal challenges. The OECD reported that in August 2023, some forty-four countries, but not the United States, had adopted simplified labelling. Do such warnings work? A meta-analysis of 134 studies on the impact of color-coded nutrition labels and warnings found that on-the-front labels “do indeed appear to encourage more healthful purchases.”

Sources: “Front-of-Package Nutrition Labeling,” Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, Office of Management and Budget, Spring 2023, https://www.reginfo.gov/public/do/eAgendaViewRule?pubId=202304&RIN=0910-AI80&itid=lk_inline_enhanced-template; Céline Giner, Daniela Rodriguez, and Armelle Elasri, “Developing Food Labels for Improved Health Outcomes,” OECD (August 2023), https://www.oecd-ilibrary.org/docserver/c1f4d81d-en.pdf?expires=1709748444&id=id&accname=guest&checksum=0094FA076C644090F3547ECAA26838A7; Jing Song et al., “Impact of Color-Coded and Warning Nutrition Labelling Schemes: A Systematic Review and Network Meta-Analysis,” PLOS Medicine 18 (10) (2021); DOI: 10.1371/journal.pmed.1003765.