12 December 2023 in Nutrition

Nutri-Score: Help or Trap?

Some of you may not have heard of the Nutri-Score system yet, but you have certainly seen the colorful markings from A to E on food products. This is exactly the Nutri-Score 🙂 I would like to explain what it is, what it means and whether it can be useful in making your daily nutritional choices.

What Is Nutri-Score?

Nutri-Score is a food labeling system that allows you to assess the nutritional value of a given product. It is shown on a five-color scale (from dark green to red) and the letters A to E. It is usually located on the front of the packaging, in the lower left corner. You will not find the Nutri-Score scale on the packaging of special-purpose medical food for infants, small children and sick people.

This system was created by French scientists to inform consumers in a simple and understandable way about the nutritional value of products so that they could make more informed dietary decisions.

Nutri-Score is recommended, among others, by the World Health Organization (WHO) and the Child Health Center, Institute of Mother and Child in Poland. However, it has not been approved as a health claim by the European Food Safety Authority (EFAS). It is a voluntary system that may be imposed across the European Union over time.

How is Nutri-Score Calculated?

Nutri-Score is calculated based on the content of ingredients in 100g of a product or 100ml of a drink using the Rayner scale.

Points are awarded for ingredients that are considered unfavorable and should be limited in the diet. Such components include: high energy value, simple sugar content, saturated fatty acids and sodium/table salt.

On the other hand, points are deducted for ingredients that are considered beneficial. The percentage of fruit, vegetables, protein and dietary fiber is taken into account here. What’s more, the positive aspects of the product include the addition of legumes, nuts, rapeseed oil and olive oil.

The points for ingredients that should be limited should be added up and the total points for ingredients showing a positive effect on the nutritional value of the product should be subtracted. This way, the product can receive a score from -15 to 40 points.

The product classification based on the points awarded to a given class is as follows:
Nutri-Score A – from -15 to -1
Nutri Score-B – from 0 to 2
Nutri-Score C – from 3 to 10
Nutri-Score D – from 11 to 18
Nutri-Score E – from 19 and more

As you can see, the lower the number of points, the better. Therefore, according to the definition of the Nutri-Score scale, products with a green marking A or B are those that are worth eating because they have high nutritional value, while products with class D or E should be eaten very rarely.

Should We Follow the Nutri-Score?

Unfortunately, the Nutri-Score scale has some limitations. These include:

Points are awarded for the nutritional value of the product given in 100g or 100ml, and not per suggested portion.

For this reason, the value of products that are usually eaten in larger quantities may be overestimated, while products that are eaten in smaller quantities may be wrongly labeled as “unhealthy”. An example is oily fish (e.g. salmon), which, due to its high fat content, will also be a higher-calorie product. This puts them in class “D”, i.e. products that should be consumed in small amounts from time to time. The same category includes, among others, hard candies. Salmon, however, is a much more valuable product than any candy, mainly due to omega-3 fatty acids.

When assessing the nutritional value of a product, the content of vitamins, minerals, or food additives, e.g. preservatives or flavor enhancers, is not taken into account.

In this way, a product that contains the entire list of food additives, but has low energy value or low content of simple sugars, may be placed in category A. A good example are zero drinks, which perform better than natural fruit juices.

The system does not take into account the degree of processing.

Brown rice compared to white rice or whole grain pasta compared to wheat pasta have a higher nutritional value due to the lower degree of processing, and therefore, among others. higher dietary fiber content and lower glycemic index. Products of this type will be a better nutritional choice than purified ones, but the Nutri-Score system does not take such ingredients into account, so both brown rice and white rice will be in the same category.

The advantages of Nutri-Score include a universal method of food labeling that is understandable to all consumers. Scientific evidence shows that using the Nutri-Score has proven effective in reducing consumers’ risk of choosing less healthy products.

The Nutri-Score system can therefore be helpful in choosing a product, but some issues require improvement, so you should be aware of its limitations. To have a full understanding of the value of a given product, I recommend that you look at the labels and composition of the product. You can find out how to read labels HERE.

We should pick the least processed products, without unnecessary additives, and pay attention to the content of vitamins and bioactive ingredients. If you lack ideas for meals prepared from unprocessed products, which are the healthiest ones, I encourage you to check out my Diet & Training by Ann application HERE and the products you can find on the Foods by Ann website HERE.

I hope that having read this article, it will be much easier for you to make conscious and informed food choices 🙂

Bibliography:

Andreeva VA, Egnell M, Touvier M, Galan P, Julia C, Hercberg S. International evidence for the effectiveness of the front-of-package nutrition label called Nutri-Score. Cent Eur J Public Health. 2021 Mar;29(1):76-79. doi: 10.21101/cejph.a6239. PMID: 33831290.
Hercberg S, Touvier M, Salas-Salvado J; Group of European scientists supporting the implementation of Nutri-Score in Europe. The Nutri-Score nutrition label. Int J Vitam Nutr Res. 2022 Jul;92(3-4):147-157. doi: 10.1024/0300-9831/a000722. Epub 2021 Jul 27. PMID: 34311557.
Song J, Brown MK, Tan M, MacGregor GA, Webster J, Campbell NRC, Trieu K, Ni Mhurchu C, Cobb LK, He FJ. Impact of color-coded and warning nutrition labelling schemes: A systematic review and network meta-analysis. PLoS Med. 2021 Oct 5;18(10):e1003765. doi: 10.1371/journal.pmed.1003765. PMID: 34610024; PMCID: PMC8491916.
Włodarek D, Dobrowolski H. Fantastic Foods and Where to Find Them-Advantages and Disadvantages of Nutri-Score in the Search for Healthier Food. Nutrients. 2022 Nov 16;14(22):4843. doi: 10.3390/nu14224843. PMID: 36432529; PMCID: PMC9694186.
Vidal-Casariego A, Amigo-Otero E, Pita-Gutiérrez F, Lugo-Rodríguez G, Almeida-Seoane C, Martínez-Ramonde T. Comparison of MUST and Nutriscore for the Screening of Malnutrition in Hospitalized Oncology Patients. Nutr Cancer. 2021;73(10):1941-1946. doi: 10.1080/01635581.2020.1817952. Epub 2020 Sep 8. PMID: 32896165.