However, it is not always easy to decipher the information contained therein and, also to make this operation truly within everyone's reach, the Minister of Agricultural, Food and Forestry Policies, Teresa Bellanova, signed a decree introducing a nutritional logo called NutrInform Battery.
for foods to be applied to packaging, aimed at making nutritional information easier for consumers to read.It is not compulsory, but voluntary: food sector operators who show a willingness to use it must inform the General Directorate for Hygiene, Food Safety and Nutrition of the Ministry of Health.
Battery-shaped indicators
The logo of the food labels shows the quantity of energy (expressed in Joules and calories), fats, saturated fats, sugars and salt (expressed in grams) present in a single portion of a given food.
However, quantitative information alone is not always enough to really communicate to the consumer how healthy or caloric the food he is about to buy is. On the new label, therefore, the battery symbol comes to the rescue, indicating the percentage of each element present, in relation to the recommended daily intake. This should help people balance their food intake, depending on their components.
Objective: to sensitize people to a "healthier diet
The basic idea of this operation, therefore, is to make the consumer aware of what he eats and to what extent his diet is balanced, healthy, varied and balanced. Calculating the quantity of nutritional elements that are ingested, in fact, allows us to understand better if you are taking the right dose or if the dose is incorrect (too much or too low).
"We are satisfied with the work done together with the agri-food supply chain and the Ministries of Health and Economic Development and we are convinced of the goodness of this system that focuses on the consumer and not the global market, enhances the critical capacity of the citizen who must not be misled from colors or images that have nothing scientific and defends the unique heritage of the Mediterranean diet », underlined the Minister, Teresa Bellanova.
The field of application of the nutritional logo excludes foods packaged in packaging or containers whose largest surface measures less than 25 cm² and PDO, PGI and TSG products referred to in Regulation (EU) no. 1151/2012, due to the risk that the affixing of further logos prevents the consumer from recognizing the quality mark.
The provision is the result of a long process of sharing with the agri-food chain and of scientific studies carried out first by the IRI Company - Information Resources Inc. Italy and then by the "Istituto Superiore di Sanità and CREA, which tested this type of labeling on samples representative of consumers.
humans. We therefore expect our system to be appropriately evaluated by "Europe from the scientific point of view, as a national experience".
