Australian children exposed to aggressive marketing on ultra-processed food, new study finds

15 Nov 2023 --- Widespread, unregulated marketing techniques targeting Australian children on the packaging of unhealthy and ultra-processed foods (UPF) have been unraveled by a recently released study by researchers at the Australian George Institute for Global Health.

The study, published in Public Health Nutrition, sheds light on Australia’s regulatory gaps in food marketing and compares them to lower-income countries with stricter rules.

“Australia mainly relies on voluntary codes for restricting unhealthy food marketing, but these primarily relate to mass media advertising, and packaging is a neglected part of the promotional toolkit,” Simone Pettigrew, one of the co-authors of the study and head of food policy at the George Institute for Global Health, tells Food Ingredients First.

The paper analyzed 8,006 products across various categories, revealing that 11.3% featured on-pack promotions directed at children, with the majority (81%) falling under the classification of UPF.

“By comparison, countries such as Chile and Mexico have introduced explicit restrictions on food packaging content to ensure children and parents are not being manipulated at the expense of children’s diets and health,” Pettigrew continues. Experts flag that Australia needs marketing restrictions that protect children from highly effective on-pack promotion. 

Regulatory gaps
She argues that Australia lacks independently developed and enforced marketing restrictions that protect children from highly effective on-pack promotion strategies.

“A related issue is that Australia’s front-of-pack nutrition labeling system, the Health Star Rating (HSR), is a voluntary system and, as such, is typically not displayed on unhealthy products.”

The categories of products examined by the researchers included: biscuits; cakes; muffins and pastries; confectionery; breakfast cereals; non-alcoholic beverages; dairy; snack foods; foods for children aged 0-36 months.

The study coded products using ten child-directed techniques, including cartoon characters and unconventional packaging. It finds that this type of packaging is most prevalent among confectionaries, snacks and dairy products aimed at infants and young children.

“Children as young as 18 months can recognize brands, and pester power is a well-evidenced phenomenon that results in children consuming suboptimal diets,’ the cho-author comments. 

“The George Institute’s latest research is further evidence that food companies are deliberately targeting children in their marketing of unhealthy foods,” says Sophie Scamps, Independent MP who introduced the Healthy Kids Advertising Bill 2023 to Parliament in June. “Given 25% of Aussie kids are above the healthy weight range, it’s clear that industry self-regulation is not working.” Researchers found that most Australian products featuring child-directed marketing were unhealthy. 

Health outcomes
The researchers also scored products based on their relative healthiness, determined through four accepted measures — the Australian Health Star Rating system, the NOVA classification system for degree of processing, the WHO nutrient profiling model for the Western Pacific Region and the Mexican nutrient profiling model.

“Our study found that most of the products featuring child-directed marketing were unhealthy, showing how important it is to provide parents with accurate nutrition information on the front of the pack to assist in overcoming promotion effects.”

The co-author further points to the correlation between products’ low nutritional value and the use of child-directed marketing.

“Child-directed promotion techniques on unhealthy products help children become familiar with unhealthy brands and encourage them to request the products from their parents. This, in turn, results in children consuming unhealthy diets. The cycle must be broken by preventing child-directed marketing of unhealthy foods and beverages.”

Policy recommendations 
In light of the research findings, Pettigrew recommends several specific interventions for the Australian government to address the issue of aggressive food marketing targeting children.Experts state that 25% of Aussie kids are above the healthy weight range.

“Regulations need to be introduced to restrict child-directed marketing on unhealthy products,” she asserts. 

WHO recently recommended mandatory regulations when marketing foods and non-alcoholic beverages high in saturated fatty acids, trans-fatty acids, free sugars or salt to children. 

“This will likely involve making the HSR mandatory to provide needed nutrition information to parents and enable the application of an HSR threshold to determine which products are restricted. For example, in some parts of Australia, school canteens cannot sell foods that fall below a 3.5 (out of 5) HSR.” 

The study’s recommendations to policymakers further specify the need to restrict child-directed marketing on packaging and social media and ensure that television, radio and cinema are free from unhealthy food marketing from 6:00 am to 9:30 pm. 

“That’s why I put forward my Healthy Kids Advertising Bill. It’s time the government stepped in to restrict food companies from saturating our children with their marketing,” she continued. “We need to create an environment for our children to thrive in, not one where they are preyed upon for profit and paying for it with their health,” says Scamps. 

Similar issues in UPF marketing to children were flagged in Canada earlier this year, with researchers similarly noting a correlation between child-directed product marketing and low nutritional value.

By Milana Nikolova