Development of a new front-of-pack nutrition label in France : the five-colour Nutri-Score

Globally, the burden of non-communicable diseases is growing and nutrition has been identified as one of the key risk factors impacting that trend. Consequently, “it is clear that nutrition represents a key lever to public health policies as it corresponds to a modifiable determinant of health that could be addressed through primary prevention interventions.” Among the different interventions, front-of-pack nutrition labelling is receiving increasing attention both from governments as well as other organisations. One of the reasons for this gain in popularity is that front-of-pack nutrition labelling is “considered helpful guidance for consumers towards healthier food choices at the point of purchase, as it delivers at-a-glance nutritional information.” Across Europe, a number of different front-of-pack labelling schemes co-exist. Nutri-Score, adopted by France in 2017, is one of them. The objective of this paper is to present “the various studies conducted in France prior to the selection of the Nutri-Score as its front-of-pack nutrition label to provide policy-makers with a framework for informed decisions.”