FSA delivers response to Ofcom consultation

Monday 3 July 2006

Agency Chair Deirdre Hutton has written to Ofcom in response to the independent communications regulator's consultation on options for tightening controls on the TV advertising of food to children.

The Agency response was sent on Friday 30 June, in line with Ofcom's extended deadline.

The FSA Board had, at its open meeting on 15 June, expressed disappointment at the options put forward in the Ofcom consultation. The Board agreed that none of the options provided a sufficient response to the problem of the imbalance in television advertising of food to children.

Deirdre Hutton, Chair of the Food Standards Agency, said in her official letter to Ofcom that the Agency supports 'a pre-9pm watershed ban on advertisements for food high in fat, salt or sugar, as we consider this offers a practical means of extending protection to older age groups, which is consistent with other broadcasting controls'.

The letter makes clear that the Agency could not support any approach that would restrict the advertising of healthier foods because this would be in direct conflict with efforts to promote healthy eating to children.

The letter also pointed out the Agency's concern that only one of the options set out in the Ofcom consultation document uses the Agency's nutrient profiling model.

The nutrient profiling model was developed to provide Ofcom with a tool for categorising foods on the basis of their nutrient content and help in its work to reduce the amount of advertising directed at children for foods high in saturated fat, sugar or salt.