The Stupidity of the Smart Choices Food Label

The food industry claims to be doing us a favor by implementing a new food labeling system that will help us make better choices at the grocery store. However, a closer look reveals that it’s probably nothing more than a marketing campaign.

This labeling system is known as the Smart Choices Program and the foods that it endorses bear a badge with a green check mark. Despite the name of the program, some of the foods that proudly display the green check mark aren’t smart choices at all.

A Few Examples of “Smart” Choices

Some of the most questionable foods that display the green Smart Choices check mark include sugary products such as Froot Loops, Cocoa Krispies, Frosted Flakes, Popsicles, Fudgsicles, Slim-Fast, and even ice cream. Other highly processed foods that are endorsed by the Smart Choices Program include egg beaters, several brands of margarine, and a number of vegetable oils.

Not only does this program undermine the importance of natural whole foods, which in my opinion represent the most important principle of healthy nutrition, but it also endorses foods that promote blood sugar fluctuation which can lead to weight gain and health problems such as suppressed immunity, adrenal fatigue, and diabetes. Many of the products supported by this program also contain a number potentially harmful chemical additives.

These foods don’t necessarily need to be avoided at all costs. However, the Smart Choices Program’s endorsement of them implies they they’re suitable as dietary staples. Processed foods, even the sugary ones, can typically be enjoyed in moderation, but relying on them as a significant portion of your diet will likely become problematic.

The “Smart” People Behind the Smart Choices Program

According to the Smart Choices Program website, the program “was created by a diverse group of scientists, academicians, health and research organizations, food and beverage manufacturers and retailers.” This includes notable universities and organizations such as Tufts university, Texas A&M university, George Mason university, the American Diabetes Association, and the American Dietetic Association.

The involvement of such universities and organizations in a program like this clearly indicates that much of modern society has completely lost touch with the most basic principles of healthy nutrition, and if that’s not the case, then the greedy food industry is exercising some major influence. I bet it’s actually a combination of both. What I find most unsettling is that the American Diabetes Association would be involved with a program that promotes processed foods containing refined sugar. Are they looking to reduce the incidence of diabetes or make it worse?

A Weak Defense for “Smart” Choices

The Smart Choices Program is so ridiculous that it even got the attention of the N.Y. Times. According to this article, the president of the board for the Smart Choices Program is a dean at Tufts university. In defense of the program’s promotion of sugary foods like Froot Loops, she says that parents can choose worse things for their children. Not only is this an extremely lame justification, but some of the foods that might be considered lesser choices, such as Fudgcicles or Popsicles, are also endorsed by the program. In my opinion, there’s much more potential to choose something healthier than Froot Loops than there is to choose something worse.

In similar fashion, one of Kellogg’s senior vice presidents claims that you can’t judge the nutritional quality of a food based on a single ingredient. In addition to this being a completely ridiculous statement, sugar isn’t the only questionable ingredient in Froot Loops. This “smart” choice breakfast cereal also contains wheat flour which is basically another form of sugar, partially hydrogenated vegetable oil which is trans fat, and artificial dyes such as red #40, blue #1, blue #2, yellow #6.

The Smart Money Program

The Smart Choices Program only endorses products that are produced by member companies, and membership is not free. According to the N.Y. Times article, membership can cost as much as $100,000 per year. Based on this, the Smart Choices Program seems to be nothing more than an exclusive club to promote and market processed foods.

Fortunately, there are currently only 16 companies participating in the Smart Choices Program. However, member companies such as Conagra, General Mills, Kellogg, Kraft, Quaker, and Tyson are industry giants and collectively represent a significant portion of the market. If their involvement in the program proves to be lucrative, other companies will likely be quick to follow.

“Smart” Fat Choices

The nutritional guidelines for foods that are endorsed by the Smart Choices Program are very much based on the dogmatic belief that fat and cholesterol cause heart disease. There’s plenty of evidence indicating that this simply isn’t true, and as such, the Smart Choices Program is doing a disservice by propagating it. Both saturated fat and cholesterol are critical to our health and are necessary for proper function of the brain, nervous system, and cell membranes. Cholesterol is also a precursor to a number of important hormones. If you still believe that saturated fat and cholesterol are unhealthy and cause heart disease, I suggest you read about busting the cholesterol myths and the Fat Head documentary.

The Smart Choices Program requires that a product’s total fat content be less than or equal to 35% of the total calories and that it’s saturated fat content be less than 10% of the total calories. Since fat contains more than twice the amount of calories as protein and carbohydrates, these amounts are small and are likely to be insufficient for some people. The one seemingly good fat related requirement of the Smart Choices Program is that the foods it endorses must not contain more than 0 grams of trans fat. However, this does not mean that these foods can’t contain any trans fat at all. Many processed food manufacturers specify small serving sizes and use small enough amounts of trans fat per serving size for it be rounded down to 0 grams.

“Smart” Sugar Choices

The Smart Choices Program acknowledges that refined sugar is unhealthy, but has set questionable limits for it. In general, they allow up to 25% of a product’s total calories to be added sugar. For a 600 calorie meal, which is representative of the 2,000 calorie per day diet that the food industry bases most of it’s nutritional data on, this would be 150 calories from added sugar which amounts to more than 35 grams! That’s just as bad, if not worse, as the sugar content in a can of soda. Perhaps if Pepsi and Coke join the exclusive Smart Choices club, some of their products will bear the green check mark as well.

For the entire day, 25% added sugar in a 2,000 calorie per day diet would be 500 calories or 125 grams of added sugar. This is only added sugar which means that it may not account for the sugar that naturally exists in some foods. Say hello to weight gain and diabetes! Did I say how disappointed I am that the American Diabetic Association is involved with this program?

If you take a closer look at the Smart Choices Program’s nutrition requirements, you can see that they are more restrictive for certain food categories. However, in my opinion, this does nothing but add subjectivity. Sugar is sugar regardless of whether it comes from a breakfast cereal, a dessert, or a beverage.

To close the discussion of sugar, I’d like to share this absolutely ridiculous quote from the Smart Choices Program website.

According to the Dietary Guidelines for Americans, in some cases, small amounts of sugars added to nutrient-dense foods, such as breakfast cereals and reduced-fat milk products, may increase a person’s intake of such foods by enhancing the palatability of these products, thus improving nutrient intake without contributing excessive calories.

First of all, it’s highly questionable to classify most breakfast cereals as a nutrient dense food. This is also the case with milk “products” which have had much of their nutrients destroyed during pasteurization and other forms of processing, especially the reduction or removal of fat. After all, fat is a nutrient, and an important one at that! The best nutrient dense foods are the whole foods provided to us by nature, and the only reason why sugar needs to be added to these foods to improve their taste is because of how extensively they’re processed and denatured by food manufacturers. Nature made these foods healthy and tasty as they are, there’s no need to reinvent them.

What About Artificial Sweeteners?

The Smart Choices Program’s nutritional requirements make no mention of potentially harmful artificial sweeteners like aspartame and splenda. This means that zero calorie products like Coke Zero and Pepsi Max would qualify for the green check mark. According to the Smart Choices Program, it’s apparently acceptable to fill your body with artificial substances that are potentially harmful as long as they don’t contain too many calories.

“Smart” Nutrient Choices

Processed foods tend to inherently be low in nutrients. Because of this, food manufactures typically add vitamins and minerals to them as part of the manufacturing process. Depending on if the nutrients are merely replacing those lost during processing, or if they’re added to increase original levels, the addition of nutrients is referred to as enrichment or fortification.

The Smart Choices Food program endorses the inclusion of nutrients such as calcium, potassium, fiber, magnesium, and vitamins A, C, and E. In general, the program requires that a food must contain at least 10% of the daily value of just one of these nutrients. This completely overlooks the fact that truly healthy foods contain most of these nutrients, and in addition, tend to also contain many others that aren’t included in this list. In addition, because most food manufacturers are mostly concerned with profit and efficiency, the nutrients used for enrichment and fortification are usually cheap synthetic varieties which are much less likely to be properly assimilated than the naturally occurring nutrients that exist in whole foods.

Don’t Blame the Food Industry

This article is not meant to be a rant against the food industry. I’d much rather write about things that are positive, but in cases such as this, I think it’s important to discuss the flaws of things like the Smart Choices Program to help you make better choices for yourself. As described above, the basis for categorizing a “smart” choice can be very subjective and political. There will always be differences of opinion, and as such, it’s your responsibility to collect information and make an informed decision for yourself. Nobody should rely on food labels, and if more people were motivated to educate themselves, food labels would be less effective and the food industry would have less incentive to invest in them.

Regardless of how deceptive and malicious the actions of big industry can be, it’s not their responsibility to make choices for you despite how hard they may try. As such, the only person you can blame for the consequences of eating unhealthy processed foods is yourself! If you continue to educate yourself and make healthier decisions, this will be much less of a concern.

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