Children’s Health: Ultra-processed Foods

Baroness Jenkin of Kennington Excerpts

Wednesday 25th October 2023 Lords Chamber

Asked by

[Baroness Jenkin of Kennington]

To ask His Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the impact of ultra-processed foods on children’s health.

[Baroness Jenkin of Kennington (Con)]

My Lords, I thank all noble Lords participating in today’s debate, apologise that they have only four minutes each, and thank those who have provided briefing. I am grateful to the First Steps Nutrition Trust, which pointed out to me that the focus of today’s debate should really be on how diets high in UPF negatively impact children’s health, rather than focusing on individual products. Its report, published in June this year, has helped to shape the debate and inform us all.

Speaking in a debate in 2016 I cited a TV series called “Junk Food Kids” and highlighted how a poor diet was leading to poor outcomes. In 2017 I chaired a report for the Centre for Social Justice called Off the Scales: Tackling England’s Childhood Obesity Crisis. It all seemed bad then, but the situation today is so much worse. Fortunately, we now know more about what is driving it, thanks to more than a decade of research amounting to many hundreds of papers linking increased consumption of ultra-processed foods to bad health outcomes.

There continues to be a debate about the definition of UPF, but I do not intend to go too far down that rabbit hole. There is a definition accepted by UNICEF, the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization, the World Health Organization, many foreign Governments including those of France, Canada and Belgium, and research groups at Cambridge, Harvard, Yale, Imperial, UCL and many other leading universities.

While the formal definition is long, a good working definition is that a food is probably ultra-processed if it contains at least one additive that you would not find in a domestic kitchen. But the additives are just part of the problem: these products are made by large corporations in a system in which all the incentives are financial. The additives signal a process in which every product is engineered to maximise consumption: the flavour, colour, taste, softness, texture and even marketing are all optimised to increase profit.

There are undoubtedly some ultra-processed products that are less harmful. I expect the Minister will mention wholemeal bread or baked beans in his response, but the evidence refers to a pattern of eating. People do not eat just one food; they eat diets, and the evidence is clear that a diet high in ultra-processed food and drink is driving not just a pandemic of weight gain but a huge number of other problems, from cancer and metabolic diseases to anxiety, depression, dementia and an early death.

Industrialised wholemeal bread does contain grains linked to good health, but it is also soft and energy-dense and contains emulsifiers, around which there are increasingly credible health concerns. No one is calling for these foods to be banned, but rather for the public to be made aware of the growing evidence around the risks and for non-ultra-processed versions of food and drink to be made affordable, accessible and convenient to everyone. No one in the UK should struggle to afford or access real food.

Global consumption of heavily processed products such as cereals, protein bars, fizzy drinks, ready meals and fast food has soared. In the UK, 60% of the average diet now consists of UPF and for some, especially people who are younger, poorer or from disadvantaged areas, including food swamps where it is hard to find a choice of food, a diet comprising as much as 80% UPF is typical. It should be the reverse, but no wonder this is the case when 70% of the UK’s largest food companies’ products are ultra-processed. What we eat is a reflection of what food companies make. If they make majority UPF, is it a surprise that our diets mirror that? These companies literally make most of what we eat: 75% of calories consumed globally come from six companies.

The hyper-palatability of food designed to appeal to children drives them to eat more. A recommended portion size of Coco Pops for an adult is 30 grams, basically a very large spoonful, but does anyone know a child who will stop at that? I doubt it. Does anyone actually weigh their child’s breakfast cereal? Similarly, a recommended serving of Pringles is 13. Has anyone in the history of eating crisps ever counted the number they eat? There is now very good evidence, including a paper published last week in the BMJ, that for many people these products are addictive. Try telling a child to eat a single bowl—it is like recommending to smokers that they stick to one cigarette. These products are designed and marketed to be consumed in excess.

As the recent Scientific Advisory Committee on Nutrition report says:

“The observed associations between higher consumption of (ultra-) processed foods and adverse health outcomes are concerning”.


Would anyone disagree? It would be interesting to know why the report did not recommend new actions to address UPF consumption given that many Governments have, including that of our nearest neighbour, France.

I turn to older children and young people, more than a third of whom now leave primary school with a weight classed as overweight or obese. Many children living in the most deprived areas are disproportionately affected. Many of these children experience stunting of up to 9 centimetres, so they are not just obese but shorter than ever before as a result of diet. These children and those older are exposed to junk food advertising all the time—bombarded, in fact. It pops up on their feeds hundreds of times a day via TikTok and other social media sites.

We know that advertising is effective—otherwise, why would it exist? I quote two teenagers, supporters of Bite Back, on their exposure to such advertising. They said:

“Scrolling on UberEats and Pinterest late at night. The donuts look delicious and I wouldn’t mind grabbing a bite. These adverts are very enticing and they are making my mouth water”,


and:

“I saw this Magnum advert on Instagram and it made me crave ice cream. It made me feel a bit peckish and definitely activated the midnight cravings … I would definitely buy these if I saw them in the shops”.


Both doughnuts and Magnums are UPF.

The counterargument comes entirely from the industry making money from these products, leading to a pandemic of diet-related disease, and the people and institutions they fund. If you are on the same side as a charity funded by a soft drink manufacturer and a sugar producer, you need to ask yourself some questions. These groups propose that sugar, fat and salt are the only determinants, but we know that mixtures of just sugar, fat and salt are not very tasty. They need texturing, emulsifying, flavouring, colouring, flavour enhancing and marketing to drive excess consumption. These are just some of the ultra-processes that turn real food into addictive substances.

Those groups propose that processing is fine, which it is. Processing is ancient and has shaped our bodies. Humans have to process our food. Ultra-processing is what happens when transnational food corporations with obligations to investors need to generate financial growth. They say that a ban would be harmful. It would. This is, tragically, the only affordable available food for many people. They say that those who want to regulate the companies that make UPF want to ban brown bread and baked beans. These are straw man arguments. No one is calling for a ban. No one is that brown bread is poisonous. No one is advising against eating baked beans. But as a category of food, there is a huge amount of evidence that UPF is linked to negative health outcomes and that it needs some light-touch regulation, such as a marketing ban for kids, a warning in the national nutrition guidance and effective labelling.

The independent groups—scientists, NGOs and activists not funded by the industry—all agree that the science around UPF is robust. In the UK, we are so saturated in industry messaging that it seems that the science is controversial. It is not. Of course, there are many more questions to answer, but we did not need to understand how smoking causes cancer to warn the public that it does.

Many ultra-processed products are high in fat, sugar and salt, so the Government should absolutely continue implementing the current policies, including the HFSS advertising and promotion restrictions that have been delayed. We need urgently to follow other Governments globally who have included advice to reduce UPF consumption in their national nutrition guidance. Latin America presents a wealth of examples of how to do this. Given that the UK consumes most of its calories from UPF, there must also be viable alternatives for everyone. Making non-ultra-processed food and drink affordable, accessible and convenient to all is critical, and unleashing business incentives so that companies can profit sustainably from making non-ultra-processed products could be game-changing.

We are able in one hour only to scratch the surface of the problems of a diet rich in UPF. If the noble Baroness, Lady Boycott, and I are able to persuade the Liaison Committee of the merits of a special inquiry into the subject, we will have the opportunity for a much deeper dive. For those who would like to hear and question Dr Chris van Tulleken, author of the bestselling book Ultra-Processed People, I am delighted that he will be speaking to a joint committee of the APPG on Obesity and the Food and Health Forum on 21 November at 5 pm.

To summarise, for the past half-century, dominant strands of nutrition science and policy have focused narrowly on single ingredients as determinants of health. Within this reductive paradigm, nutrients are systematically decontextualised from the foods, dietary patterns, social contexts and food systems in which they are embedded. This perspective has singularly failed to curb rising levels of obesity and dietary ill-health. Research on UPF and related issues is beginning to reveal why. I look forward to noble Lords’ contributions and to the Minister’s response.