Creme helps industry to address EU health claims

As the European Union increases its crackdown on food companies that advertise nutritional health benefits without sufficient validated scientific backing, many food companies, including cereal manufacturers may be forced to abandon health claims used to promote their products.

This increases the pressure on food manufacturers to help maintain or enhance consumer health and well-being.

In order to make health claims about a product or ingredient, food companies will have to prove that their product meets a certain profile in terms of appropriate levels of each ingredient, including sugar, fat and salt. Even if a company can prove that a product contains a healthy ingredient with a particular health benefit, they may not be able to market that benefit if that product contains other nutrients included at levels above defined healthy limits. See EU bites into cereals' health claims

How Creme is helping food companies to address these new requirements

Creme has conducted many nutritional health studies for both industry and government, as a means of verifying nutritional health claims.

Creme set up a successful Salt Intake Model for the Food Safety Authority of Ireland (FSAI). The FSAI use this model to estimate the effect of salt reduction in foods on lowering salt intakes in the Irish population.

We have built similar models for food companies who require reductions in the levels of sugar, fat, salt or other nutrients in their product ranges. Creme assesses the options for replacement ingredients, based on our clients requirements. A consumer intake assessment is carried out for each replacement ingredient to ensure safety. Based on this scenario analysis, the best possible decision can be made on the new product formulation.

Now is the time for food manufacturers to start using all of the available evidence to protect their markets and brands. Using Creme, our clients can conduct dietary intake modelling to measure nutritional, raw ingredient and vitamin intakes for their customers. They can examine individual ingredients to assess intakes of a particular nutrient, and they can examine the product as a whole to ensure that the combined effect of all the nutrients and ingredients in a product can be considered healthy.

Creme does not simply consider the intake for that single product or ingredient alone. The aim of fortified products is to increase the intake of a particular beneficial ingredient to reduce the likelihood of deficiency. We also recognise that too high an intake of some ingredients may be detrimental to health. It is important therefore that the level of fortification in a particular product does not lead to overall intakes that are too high. Where there are multiple sources of an ingredient in the diet, estimation of intake must take into account all of the available sources. Creme's dietary intake modelling can easily and efficiently assess intakes from the total diet to ensure consumers health is protected.

Some of the advantages of using Creme (according to our customers):

• Acceptability of model outcome by external experts (e.g regulators and leading academics)
• Allows easy modelling of large data sets (e.g. NDNS, NHANES data)
• Accuracy - using the most up-to-date available data in conjunction with our unique modelling system
• Easy to filter survey results (e.g. to assess demographic groups that are most at risk)
• Easy to incorporate market share data to provide accurate and realistic results

Contact us now to discuss your requirements in confidence. We would be happy to meet you to review your new product development and safety processes to show you how Creme can add significant benefits in this area.