According to a survey, excessive amounts of added sugar and honey are present in the top baby food products from Nestle. The Swiss investigative group Public Eye claims that Nestle’s brands that are marketed in low- and middle-income nations include sugar. International guidelines designed to avoid obesity and chronic diseases are at odds with this.
According to the report, all Cerelac baby cereals in India—where sales are expected to top $250 million in 2022—contain added sugar, with each serving averaging around three grammes.
Similar circumstances exist in South Africa, the continent’s largest market, when it was discovered that every serving of Cerelac infant cereal included four grammes or more of added sugar.
Around three-quarters of Cerelac infant cereals (known as Mucilon in the country) contain added sugar, with an average of three grammes per serving. Brazil is the second-largest market in the world, with projected sales of approximately 150 million dollars in 2022.
It was discovered that toddler-targeted products in the Philippines had no added sugar.
However, Nido baby food items, marketed as Dancow in Indonesia, all had 0.8g of added sugar per 100g of product in the form of honey, or around 2g of extra sugar per 100g of product.
Two of the three toddler-friendly Nido products available in Mexico had no added sugar, but the third had 1.7g per serving. According to the survey, Nido Kinder 1+ products offered in Senegal, Nigeria, and South Africa all included roughly 1g of protein per serving.
The results were found after campaigners from Public Eye sent samples of the Swiss multinational’s baby-food products sold in Asia, Africa and Latin America to a Belgian laboratory for testing.
The results, and examination of product packaging, revealed added sugar in the form of sucrose or honey in samples of Nido, a follow-up milk formula brand intended for use for infants aged one and above, and Cerelac, a cereal aimed at children aged between six months and two years.
The study also discovered that in Nestle’s primary European markets, which include the UK, there was no added sugar in infant formulae. While additional sugar was discovered in certain cereals intended for older toddlers, it was not discovered in any goods intended for newborns between the ages of six months and one year.
The World Health Organization’s guidelines for the European region state that no food for children under three years old should contain added sugars or sweeteners.
Tests conducted on merchandise under the Nido brand, which has over $1 billion in retail sales worldwide, showed a notable variance in sugar content.
