A new report published today by Action on Salt and Action on Sugar looks into the healthiness of food and drink bought out of home, and calls for increased nutrition transparency in the out of home sector.

Healthiness in the UK OOH Sector [PDF 5,552KB]

Less healthy diets are among the leading risk factors for the global burden of disease, largely driven by their association with cardiovascular diseases, type 2 diabetes, and cancer.  An increasing share of our diet now comes from the food we consume out of home (OOH), with restaurants and takeaways said to provide up to 25% of the calories we eat. Over half of our OOH food expenditure is bought from large chains. 

In contrast with packaged foods, reporting on health and nutrition in the OOH sector is scarce and inconsistent. In the UK, mandatory calorie labelling for large OOH businesses only came into force in 2022, yet companies often report little more nutrition information at point of purchase. Out of 20 leading companies, only three publicly discloses full nutrition information, per 100g and per serve, as well as ingredients list.  This lack of nutrition information makes it difficult to set standards for product healthiness in the sector and independently monitor any progress made.

The researchers set out to assess the healthiness of the products currently dominating the UK OOH market using a range of UK government-endorsed models and metrics to classify each product as either ‘healthier’ or ‘less healthy’. This included the UK Nutrient Profile Model, a summary health score for food, as well as reformulation targets.  

Out of all models and metrics used, the researchers recommend a combination of metrics, which looks at both nutrient balance and applies category-specific caps for the amount of calories, salt, and sugar contained in a product, to account for the excessive portion sizes often provided in this sector. Using this approach, a sizeable share of the products currently dominating the UK OOH market are less healthy.  

Given the increasing role that OOH companies are playing in the population diet, there is now an urgent need to develop and enforce policy measures to incentivise OOH companies to offer, and/or shift their sales towards, healthier products. A first step would be for them to provide sufficient and consistent information about the products they sell, which would bring them in line with the rest of the food sector.

Dr Monique Tan, Lead Researcher and Lecturer at Queen Mary University of London says: “Businesses are likely to only improve their products up to the standards we hold them against, so choosing the right standards is crucial. Given the growing influence of out of home foods in our daily diets, the new Government must now seize the opportunity to develop tailored healthiness standards for the out of home sector. They can do so by giving teeth to the Food Data Transparency Partnership, an initiative instigated under previous Government to improve data provision in the UK food supply chain, and which is still under development.” 

Dr Kawther Hashem, Co-author and Head of Research and Impact at Action on Sugar adds: “It is absurd that supermarkets are expected to be as transparent as possible about what they put in their products, from nutrition information, ingredients, allergens and portion size, but when eating out we are left in the dark. If companies continue to hide their nutrition information, there is little hope for consumers to choose the healthier options. The government needs to act now to resolve this unfair situation and level the playing fired.” 

This report was delivered in collaboration with the Obesity Health Alliance and Bite Back. We thank ShareAction for funding this research.