Rethinking EU Food Law: Addressing Slow Harm in the Age of Ultra-Processed Foods

The EU has lengthy championed meals security as a pillar of shopper safety. From its origins in market harmonisation to the post-BSE shift towards shopper security, the EU’s meals regulation regime has matured right into a globally influential framework. But, as dietary landscapes rework, notably with the dominance of ultra-processed meals (UPFs), it’s more and more clear that EU meals regulation is ill-equipped to deal with one of the crucial insidious threats to public well being: sluggish hurt.

Gradual hurt refers back to the gradual, cumulative harm brought on by sustained publicity to dangerous situations or substances. Within the context of UPFs, it encapsulates the power well being results linked to their long-term consumption—weight problems, kind 2 diabetes, heart problems, and cognitive decline, to call a number of. Whereas the Common Meals Regulation (Regulation (EC) No 178/2002) gives instruments for addressing acute meals hazards, it largely neglects the systemic, cross-sectoral dangers related to UPFs.

This submit appears at that regulatory hole by analysing three interrelated points: the restrictions of the present hazard-based framework, the structural challenges in attributing duty for cumulative dietary hurt, and the inadequacy of shopper data fashions. I argue that these dimensions collectively illustrate the necessity for a recalibrated method to EU meals regulation to be able to addressing the realities of up to date consumption.

Restricted Meals Regulation’s Hazard Paradigm

The EU meals security framework defines meals hazards as organic, chemical, or bodily dangers (Article 3(14) of the Regulation (EC) No 178/2002). Regulatory responses are designed round acute threats: contamination, spoilage, pathogens. This paradigm permits swift motion, equivalent to recollects and withdrawals of affected meals merchandise. But it surely additionally constrains the authorized creativeness, excluding sluggish hurt from its scope. The result’s a regulatory blind spot: UPFs, which contribute considerably to public well being deterioration, are thought of technically protected per present normal.

Though Article 14 of Regulation (EC) No 178/2002 recognises long-term dangers by means of the notion of “cumulative poisonous results,” in observe this refers to chemical publicity from particular person substances. It doesn’t account for the broader dietary setting by which these meals are consumed, nor for the cumulative influence of UPFs throughout the market. A bottle of soda or a snack bar may individually pose no danger. However the structural embedding of such merchandise in on a regular basis diets results in population-wide hurt.

One other hole lies within the remedy of meals processing itself. In depth industrial processing reduces nutrient content material, provides dangerous compounds like acrylamides and superior glycation end-products, and transforms meals matrices in ways in which have an effect on digestion and metabolism. But none of those components qualify as hazards beneath present EU definitions.

This oversight permits UPFs to be labelled and marketed as protected, regardless of mounting epidemiological proof linking them to severe well being situations. Scientific our bodies together with the World Well being Group (WHO) have more and more pointed to UPFs as a driver of the worldwide non-communicable illness burden. By failing to think about processing as a related danger issue, EU regulation stays tethered to an outdated conception of meals security.

Lack of Holistic Strategy to Cumulative Results of Hurt

The EU’s product-by-product regulatory mannequin assigns duty to particular person producers for making certain that every meals merchandise is protected. Beneath this mannequin, if a selected meals product is discovered unsafe, the producer is predicted to take remedial motion. This method is designed across the three classes of hazards outlined within the Common Meals Regulation—organic, chemical, and bodily. In these circumstances, duty is evident and focused: every producer is accountable for managing particular dangers related to their product.

Nonetheless, this mannequin falls brief with regards to addressing cumulative dietary hurt. Whereas particular person merchandise might adjust to established security requirements, their mixed impact—such because the extreme consumption of sugars, trans fat, components, and publicity to industrial processing—can generate hostile well being outcomes over time. Not like acute hazards, the mixture danger from UPFs is diffuse. In impact, whereas product-level duty operates effectively for discrete hazards, the cumulative hurt arising from UPF consumption in the end falls on shoppers, who bear the well being burden with out corresponding avenues for redress.

Meals components present a transparent illustration of this hole. They’re regulated by means of the Meals Components Regulation (EC No 1333/2008), which assigns Acceptable Day by day Intakes (ADIs) to particular person substances based mostly largely on animal testing and established security margins. But, these ADIs don’t take into consideration the “cocktail impact” —the mixed influence of a number of components consumed concurrently. Rising proof means that such mixtures might have an effect on intestine microbiota, endocrine perform, and inflammatory pathways. Regardless of these considerations, EU regulation doesn’t require testing for additive interactions nor compel the disclosure of additive portions on labels. Consequently, the shortage of a mechanism for assessing cumulative publicity leaves shoppers unprotected from probably important long-term results.

The Informational Paradigm: Burdening the Client

The EU’s most popular answer to dietary hurt is knowledgeable shopper selection. Rules just like the Meals Info to Shoppers (FIC) Regulation (EU No 1169/2011) mandate clear labelling, whereas the Diet and Well being Claims Regulation (EC No 1924/2006) units guidelines for on-pack messaging. These instruments purpose to empower shoppers to make knowledgeable choices to keep away from hurt.

However this empowerment assumes equal capability amongst shoppers to interpret and act on offered data. It ignores structural inequalities that form dietary behaviour. Particularly for lower-income teams, meals deserts, time shortage, and common financial precarity can restrict entry to contemporary, nutritious meals options. Label studying is of little assist if UPFs are the one inexpensive or accessible possibility. Proof reveals that these teams devour UPFs at larger charges, face better publicity to their harms, and lack the assets to mitigate them.

Furthermore, the informational mannequin absolves regulators and producers of duty. By casting meals hurt as a matter of selection, it deflects consideration from the methods and insurance policies that normalise unhealthy diets, on this approach entrenching well being disparities.

Reimagining Meals Regulation

Nations equivalent to Chile, Mexico, and Brazil have moved past information-based approaches by adopting structural measures to restrict the consumption of UPFs. These embrace front-of-pack warning labels, restrictions in colleges, and dietary tips that explicitly discourage UPF consumption. These methods shift duty away from particular person shoppers and in the direction of systemic regulatory intervention.

The EU can draw from these fashions with out abandoning current authorized rules. EU meals regulation already accommodates underused instruments able to addressing sluggish, cumulative dietary hurt. Article 14 of the Common Meals Regulation prohibits meals that’s “injurious to well being”—an idea historically utilized to acute dangers posed by particular person merchandise. But it might be interpreted extra broadly to embody population-level hurt ensuing from power UPF consumption. This may allow regulatory motion not solely in opposition to remoted unsafe gadgets but in addition in opposition to structurally dangerous dietary patterns.

The precautionary precept supplies an extra authorized foundation for intervention the place scientific proof is rising however not but conclusive. It permits protecting motion within the face of believable well being dangers—notably related in mild of rising however still-developing proof on the cumulative and interactive results of components, processing, and UPF consumption. Collectively, these rules might help a extra forward-looking regulatory method.

UPFs don’t match neatly right into a framework designed to deal with discrete, short-term hazards. But their long-term results are not any much less important. Reform needn’t entail legislative overhaul. A revised software of current provisions, mixed with an expanded remit for the European Meals Security Authority, might permit danger assessments to deal with cumulative exposures, processing results, and broader dietary tendencies. Recognising sluggish hurt as a authentic regulatory concern—and deploying the instruments already obtainable—would deliver EU meals regulation nearer to its acknowledged goal: making certain a excessive stage of safety for public well being in a structurally altered meals setting.

Dr Asta Zokaityte is Senior Lecturer at Kent Regulation College, College of Kent. Her analysis focuses on the socio-legal and gendered dimensions of monetary governance, shopper safety, and business regulation. She teaches Client Regulation, Contract Regulation, Business Credit score, Company Governance, and Firm Regulation at each undergraduate and postgraduate ranges. Her work is cited throughout regulation, economics, and the social sciences. She has held fellowships, together with on the Info Society Regulation Centre, and serves on the editorial boards of Feminists@regulation and Frequent Regulation World Evaluation.