Campaigners are calling for a ban on promotions and price cuts for “sharing bags” of chocolates which many children and adults eat by themselves, consuming as much as 20 teaspoons of sugar in one sitting and contributing to the obesity crisis.
The charity Action on Sugar is also calling for a 20% sugar tax on all confectionery, which it says is the second highest source of sugar in children’s diets after soft drinks.
Discounts make the “sharing bags” better value than individual packs. If price promotions were banned, says the campaigning charity, fewer sweets and chocolates would be bought – it estimates such a move would lead to a drop of 6% in the highest sugar confectionery purchased, which would lead to a cut of two teaspoons of sugar a day from every individual’s diet.
Action on Sugar examined 95 sharing bags and found sugar content ranging from 29 teaspoons in Brookside dark chocolate pomegranate flavour (198g) to 23 in Marks and Spencer’s gigantic milk chocolate buttons (170g) to 20 in Galaxy Minstrels (118g). The lowest was one teaspoon in Chocologic giant dark chocolate buttons 75g, labelled as “no added sugar”.
Graham MacGregor, professor of cardiovascular medicine at Queen Mary University of London and chairman of Action on Sugar said: “It is shocking that food companies are being allowed to exploit consumers by manipulating them into purchasing larger size bags of chocolate confectionery on the cheap. Theresa May is letting companies get away with this despite pledging to help the socially deprived when she first became the prime minister. Companies must be held accountable and reminded to reconsider their ethical and corporate responsibility.”
Caroline Cerny of the Obesity Health Alliance said: “There’s no doubt that large portion sizes encourage people to eat more. Companies have a huge role to play in helping tackle the obesity epidemic by reducing the amount of sugar in the products. The government’s reformulation programme is a positive step, and we’d urge them to go further by clamping down on marketing and promotions of foods high in salt, sugar and saturated fat.”
