Sugary fruit likely to get second chance on food list

New Zealand's food safety agency says it will fix a proposed food standard to ensure fruit and vegetables can be classed as healthy.

The Herald reported yesterday (see link at foot of page) that the draft standard - proposed by transtasman agency Food Standards Australia New Zealand (FSANZ) - was due to exclude apples, pears and most stonefruit because of their high sugar content.

FSANZ spokeswoman Lydia Buchtmann said the agency would find a way to solve the problem, possibly with an exemption clause.

"We want fruit and vegetables to be promoted because they are part of a healthy diet and are looking at ways of ensuring that they will be able to make health claims, even if they are likely to have a reasonably high level of sugar content," she said.

"One way we're likely to look at is just an exemption for fruit and vegetables."

At present the standard, which should be finalised by the end of the year, has threshold levels for sugar, fat and salt content. If approved, it would be illegal for products that breach any threshold to carry a health claim, even if the item has other nutritional value.

This would mean sellers of apples, pears and most stonefruit could not advertise them as healthy because their natural sugar levels are too high, which has lead to an outcry from nutritionists and orchardists.

Ms Buchtmann said it was never the agency's intention to penalise "inherently healthy products such as fruit and vegetables".

She said some sugary cereals were low in fat, thus claiming to reduce the risk of heart disease.

"Cheese has the same problem. We should be eating it with a healthy diet but obviously it has a high fat content. So it's very hard to draw the line."

But apples, pears and stonefruit could be exempted, including when they were cut up and preserved, so long as fruit juices and other sugars were not added.

Dr Mike Butcher, of Pipfruit New Zealand, said it would be "common sense" to differentiate between foods where sugar was added, such as most processed foods, and those with natural sugar.

"It's good to see standards being put around food label claims, as it appears to be so easy to get away with quite unsubstantiated claims."

Submissions on the draft are open until March 31.

- additional reporting NZPA