Unhealthy items lift FMCG food revenue

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ITC came out looking the best among Indian companies by healthiness score, followed by Hindustan Unilever, Nestlé India, PepsiCo India and Coca-Cola India. But that is really nothing to crow about. “The mean healthiness of companies’ products was found to be 1.9 stars out of 5.0 (the same as in 2020), with substantial variation observed between companies.

Over half or 55.6% of all products on the market scored 1.5 out of 5 stars or below. Overall, 12% of products were eligible to be marketed to children according to the World Health Organization South-East Region (WHO SEAR) criteria," ATNI said on Wednesday. The index used the internationally recognized Health Star Rating (HSR) nutrient profiling model, which is also endorsed by several governments.

Products with a score of 3.5 stars or more out of 5 HSR can be confidently promoted in public settings as healthier choices, it said. “There is room for improvement, but it also shows that the industry can have a positive contribution. And we realized that in India, the food produced by industry is only providing for part of the average Indian family’s diet.

A lot of food is still consumed in the informal markets," Mark Wijne, research director, ATNI, said in an interview. Meanwhile, seven companies were found to have at least one reformulation target in place to reduce nutrients of concern such as sodium, saturated fats and sugar in their portfolio. Hindustan Unilever, ITC and PepsiCo India stand out for having set targets to reduce all three nutrients of concern (salt, sugar and saturated fat) for at least part of their product portfolio, the report said.