Food Labelling - who won, who lost

So the big bad food manufacturers have won again - according to the media reports. The EU parliament has turned down the proposal to mandate simple traffic lights on all food products, and the food manufacturers are being blamed.

Well, yes, if you believe that this would save lives and stop people eating bad diets, then this is correct. Many medics have come to the fray bemoaning a lost opportunity, blaming capitalism for taking lives.

But the truth is simpler and starker. Many, many years ago the majority of the population gave control over their diets to the industrialised food industry. Whole swathes rely on factory-produced food to create recipes and product formats, to produce and pack their entire daily intake, and then to deliver it in highly convenient covered markets. This began in the 19th century in Britain, and the process is almost complete.

The results have been predictable. Big profits and big bellies. And now the last straw, of asking the same industry that feeds you to make choosing so-o-o simple that even a child trained to recognise a green blob, a yellow blob and a red blob can make the right choices. Have you sunk so low that you not only need them to cook and provide for you, but simplify the process to the level of a four year old? Well, yes, so it would seem.

In a way, I'm surprised the manufacturers didn't see it as an opportunity. Green blob foods would sell more, and if they could be made from similarly cheap ingredients that sweet and fatty foods are made from, the profits would be large. I guess they just got scared.

The truth is so simple it scares most consumers. The great Colin Tudge has it right - plenty of fruit and vegetables, not very much meat and plenty of variety in colour and texture. Trouble is, the ready meal of chicken tikka masala doesn't really have a place in this regime.

I heard a female journalist berating an industry lapdog for suggesting that providing detailed nutritional information on packs was no solution, as 'we don't have time to read all that'. So the food you eat and give your children to eat isn't important enough to sacrifice another five minutes reading 'Heat' or watching Simon Cowell?

Well, shame on you and shame on the people who think like you, and shame on the the whole damn lot of them. You don't deserve to live in a world where you worry not about food or where it's going to come from.