Finding the Right PACE to Tackling the Obesity Epidemic
How a New Approach to Food Labelling Could Help Tackle the Global Obesity Crisis
Over 50 percent of the world’s population are living with being overweight. This puts most of the global population at greater risk of developing chronic illnesses that are considered some of the leading causes of death, including heart disease, stroke, and cancers of different varieties.
In nearly every region of the world, except sub-Saharan Africa and Asia, more people are living with obesity than are underweight. In the U.S. alone, over 40 percent of the adult population — and almost 20 percent of children and adolescents — are classed as obese.
But what interventions are available to help prevent further cases?
Research led by Loughborough University, in the U.K., indicates that, in addition to calorie information, labelling food and drinks with the amount and type of physical activity needed to expend or burn off the calories they contain might be an effective way of encouraging people to make more health-conscious dietary choices and might contribute to reducing the number of people who are living with being overweight. Calorie labelling in out-of-home settings is becoming increasingly mandated by governments, including both in the U.S. and the U.K., where it is now a requirement for the calories in food to be displayed for consumers to see in places such as restaurants, cafeterias, and take-away food menus.
Labelling isn’t new — effective food and nutritional labelling is one of the key strategies used around the world to guide people in making “healthier” decisions. But we need a new system that’s easy to understand, doesn’t demonize food, and ultimately gets people to cut back on the excess calories they are consuming.
Finding a food labelling system that works
Many countries have adopted nutritional information panels to package labelling. In this system, consumers see, at a quick glance, the nutritional content of a specific product or recipe, and can learn whether a product can be consumed regularly, in large amounts, or needs to be restricted.
But while the system is highly-adopted, the information on these labels is considered confusing and complex by some and is not favored by the food industry. Even in places like the U.S. and U.K., where nutritional labelling systems have been in place for many years, there are concerns that the overwhelming amount of nutritional information on food packaging is no longer helping people to make healthier choices.
Research from Loughborough University’s Centre for Lifestyle Medicine and Behaviour (CLiMB) has been evaluating a new approach to labelling food known as “Physical Activity Calorie Equivalent” (PACE) food labelling. Under this system, consumers are shown how many minutes or miles of physical activity they need to exert to burn off the calories in specific food or drinks. For example, eating 230 calories in a small bar of chocolate would require about 46 minutes of walking or 23 minutes of running to burn off the calories it contains.
A program of research on the usefulness of PACE labelling is being led by Amanda Daley, a professor at Loughborough. This research has shown that the public thinks that PACE labelling would be easier to understand than current approaches to labelling food, and would be more likely to help consumers to avoid high-calorie foods.
Researchers at the University have also found that PACE labelling was viewed by children as easy-to-understand, visually-appealing, and more eye-catching than current labelling approaches. Children also welcomed PACE labelling as a way to help and nudge them to make healthier food and drink choices, reduce excess energy consumption, and encourage more physical activity.
“PACE labelling provides another approach to nutrition labelling, by providing calorie information with a meaningful interpretation of the amount of physical activity needed to expend the calories contained in food and drink.”
Ultimately, says Daley, PACE labelling can help steer consumers towards healthier options to purchase when it comes to food and drink. “When you know how the equivalent amount of walking or running required to burn off high calorie foods such as cakes, muffins, cookies and sodas, which typically have very high calorie loads, consumers may be less likely to want to eat them.”
An example of what PACE labels might look like if they were used on grocery store products.
An example of what PACE labels might look like if they were used on grocery store products.
PACE food labelling shows the number of calories alongside the physical activity required to burn them.
PACE food labelling shows the number of calories alongside the physical activity required to burn them.
The calculation for cutting calorie consumption
The team’s studies have included a review of existing food labelling studies, and a national Knowledge Panel Survey that asked participants for their views about PACE labelling. In a third study the Loughborough team looked at whether PACE information prevented people gaining weight.
A visual of how PACE labelling could be applied to a soda can.
A visual of how PACE labelling could be applied to a soda can.
The results from the first study showed that when PACE labelling was displayed on food and drink items and on menus, on average, approximately 65 fewer calories were selected for consumption per eating occasion (including meals). From this, the team calculated that PACE labelling might potentially reduce calorie consumption by around 200 calories per day, based on the average consumption of three meals a per day.
In the second study, the research team surveyed a representative sample of adults throughout the United Kingdom to ask their views on PACE labelling compared to the country’s current traffic light approach to nutritional labelling. Most participants said that PACE labelling was easier to understand and more likely to catch their attention. The study also showed that participants felt PACE labelling was more likely to help them avoid high-calorie foods than traffic light labelling.
This second study also identified a preference for PACE labelling to be placed on discretionary foods, such as chocolate and cakes, rather than “everyday” food items like bread, pasta, fruit, and vegetables. Participants though that PACE labelling would be particularly useful in fast food outlets, supermarkets, takeaway/online menus, and vending machines — all locations that typically sell high-energy dense food and drinks.
In the third study, it was found that providing the physical activity equivalent information about the number of calories in popular foods and drinks eaten during the Christmas holiday period prevented a small amount of weight gain after the holiday season.
Next steps
Past research has shown that even a relatively small reduction in daily calorie intake combined with a sustained increase in physical activity is likely to be beneficial for health. Daley believes the PACE approach to labelling food could be easily included on food and drinks packaging by manufacturers, on shelving price labels in supermarkets, and on menus in restaurants and fast-food outlets. Her team is currently testing whether PACE labelling reduces the purchases of high-calorie foods and drinks in different food settings such as restaurants, vending machines, and school canteens.
“Public health agencies may want to consider the possibility of including policies to promote PACE labelling as a strategy that contributes to the prevention and treatment of obesity and related diseases,” Daley says.
“Whilst our initial research is pointing to PACE labelling being useful, it has been suggested that labelling that contains calorie information may have unintended negative consequences for eating disorders. This is a very important concern and people who are experiencing an eating disorder require support, but we must also consider the high number of people who are living with overweight and obesity.
“Introducing labelling such as PACE isn’t looking to demonize food – instead, it’s an approach that encourages consumers to make decisions that contribute towards a balanced and healthy approach to food. PACE labelling is also not aiming to persuade the public that they should burn off every calorie they eat, rather it is proposed as an approach that could complement existing food labels and offer calorie information in a more meaningful format.”
While PACE labelling cannot solve the problem of overweight and obese on its own, it is one promising approach that might help, and there is certainly a need to motivate the food industry to move towards producing lower calorie food and drinks. PACE labelling could contribute towards making this happen.
Loughborough is one of the UK’s leading universities, with an international reputation for research that matters, excellence in teaching, strong links with industry, and unrivalled achievement in sport and its underpinning academic disciplines. It has been awarded five stars in the independent QS Stars university rating scheme, named the best university in the world for sports-related subjects in the 2023 QS World University Rankings and University of the Year for Sport by The Times and Sunday Times University Guide 2022. The University has been awarded seven Queen’s Anniversary Prizes, and in the Research Excellence Framework (REF) 2021 over 90% of its research was rated as ‘world-leading’ or ‘internationally-excellent’.
This content was paid for and created by Loughborough University. The editorial staff of The Chronicle had no role in its preparation. Find out more about paid content.
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