Remove 20 per cent of sugar from children’s food, PHE says

A programme led by Public Health England (PHE) has called on food and drink industry businesses to remove 20 per cent of the sugar from food eaten by regularly by children.

The announcement was made at a PHE briefing on the reduction and reformulation programme, with food and drink industry businesses, health charities and campaign groups in attendance.

The programme is a amor players in the government’s childhood obesity plan.

Duncan Selbie, PHE chief executive, commented: “It’s shocking that a third of children leaving primary school are overweight or obese. We need take action now to ensure more children do not continue down that path into adulthood and suffer serious health complications as a result.

“What’s in our food and drink clearly affects our health and the food and drink industry can be a powerful influence on what we eat. We’re pleased to be leading together on what we believe will be the most extensive, formal and structured programme of food reformulation anywhere in the world.”

At the briefing, the food and drinks industry was advised to remove 20 per cent of the sugar from food categories that contribute the most to children’s diets by 2020, starting with five per cent in year 1.

PHE confirmed it will support this by setting clear targets, close monitoring and the publication of transparent and comparable data and expects work to continue to meet the existing salt reduction targets for 2017

Later in 2017, PHE will develop a similar overall reduction programme for calories, which may
eventually include targets on saturated fats, but this will be subject to the outcome of the Scientific

Advisory Committee on Nutrition (SACN) review on saturated fats, due in 2017.

PHE also said would publish regular reports giving details of the progress made.