Snack bar maker Kind
wants U.S. government to change labeling standard
Send a link to a friend
[December 01, 2015]
By Anjali Athavaley
NEW YORK (Reuters) - Kind LLC wants a U.S.
federal agency to change its standards for what can be labeled as
healthy, months after the snack bar maker received a warning letter for
using the term on packaging for bars that were deemed too fatty.
|
Kind argues that fat from items like fruits, vegetables, nuts and
whole grains should not be counted in the tally, in a citizen
petition the company said it plans to file with the U.S. Food and
Drug Administration on Tuesday, a copy of which was seen by Reuters.
An FDA spokeswoman declined comment, but said the agency would
respond directly to Kind once a petition is filed. Kind's petition
would be reviewed by the agency's commissioner and open for public
comment, according to the FDA's process for dealing with petitions.
The dispute represents a new front in an emerging battle over what
is officially considered healthy in the United States, in the light
of dietary research over the past two decades pointing to processed
sugar in foods, rather than fat, as a greater threat to health.
![](http://archives.lincolndailynews.com/2015/Dec/01/images/ads/current/best_friends_sda_010515.png)
Under current rules laid down by the FDA, foods labeled as healthy
must contain less than 3 grams of total fat and less than 1 gram of
saturated fat per serving.
Kind, known for its nut-based bars wrapped in clear packaging,
received a warning letter in March from the FDA for exceeding those
limits.
“Once we learned that we had not done a couple of regulatory things
correctly and we fixed them, we delved deeper into understanding the
rationale of those regulations,” said Daniel Lubetzky, Kind’s
founder and chief executive, in an interview. “There was one aspect
to those regulations that we really felt was not in the interest of
public policy.”
[to top of second column] |
![](../images/ads/current/Symphony_122313.png)
Created in 1993, when dietary recommendations focused on limiting
fat intake rather than sugar, the rules prohibit foods that are
nutrient-dense from being marketed as healthy, Lubetzky said.
Products such as sugary cereal and low-fat pudding meet the
definition while foods like avocados and salmon are too high in fat.
Some experts said that while they do not endorse Kind bars
specifically, the FDA should update food labeling standards to
reflect changing views on fat.
The case of Kind "shows the fragmented and outdated nature of a lot
of our federal policy," said Dariush Mozaffarian, Dean of the
Friedman School of Nutrition Science & Policy at Tufts University.
(Reporting by Anjali Athavaley; Editing by Bill Rigby)
[© 2015 Thomson Reuters. All rights
reserved.] Copyright 2015 Reuters. All rights reserved. This material may not be published,
broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
![](http://archives.lincolndailynews.com/2015/Dec/01/images/ads/current/World_Finance_sda_christmas_102715.png) |