NRA - No the other one

<span style="font-size: large;">    A nutrition study group with The National Restaurant Association will meet later this month to discuss several things, including nutrition labeling.  There are a few other agenda items that may interest you.  For instance, challenges the industry faces as they attempt to reduce sodium levels in foods and how to provide nutrition education to Hispanic Consumers (their words).  They will also discuss GMOs, or genetically modified foods.  I do not stay informed on that issue but I have several friends who are passionate about the need to <span style="font-size: large;">provide</span> GMO labels on products.  Some be<span style="font-size: large;">lieve that G<span style="font-size: large;">MOs are harmful and<span style="font-size: large;"> </span></span></span>that people should avoid buying them. At the very least, they argue, people should know if thei<span style="font-size: large;">r products contain them. </span> My food relat<span style="font-size: large;">ed </span>focus is macronutrients and calories, <span style="font-size: large;">so I push for expanded labeling <span style="font-size: large;">in that area</span></span>.</span><br /><span style="font-size: large;">   Interestingly, I was recently asked to send a letter to some restaurants to encourage them to provide nutrition information to their customers. I did si<span style="font-size: large;">gn the form letter </span>and one of the restaurants on the list responded to me directly (so to speak).  They let me know how important t<span style="font-size: large;">hey <span style="font-size: large;">believed nutrition information was<span style="font-size: large;"> </span></span></span>to their customers.  Because of their committ<span style="font-size: large;">ment to them</span>, they provide<span style="font-size: large;"> all the nutrition info<span style="font-size: large;"> for their</span></span> menu items on their WEBSITE.  Of course, I replied that it needed to be on the menu with the food so that people could see it while making decisions about their purchases.  There may be some discrepancies in the menu labeling research, but<span style="font-size: large;"> the<span style="font-size: large;">re is no question that</span></span> information given outside of the restaurant is not as effective as inf<span style="font-size: large;">ormation given ins<span style="font-size: large;">ide at the</span></span> point of decision making. </span><br /><span style="font-size: large;">    And lastly, a new study that used the traffic light system on restaurant menus has recently been published.  This experiment was done online.  People looked at make believe menus and reported what they would order.  It was not a field experiment and no real purchases were made.  Still, an interesting finding of this study is that too much information was no better than having no information (in regards to choosing the lower calorie meals).  The percent daily value statement was one of the unhelpful pieces of information.  AGREED.  The calorie only and the calorie with either green (400 or less calories), amber or red (more than 800) were both related to lower calorie choices.  The study was conducted in Australia and the lead author was Belinda Morely.</span>

NRA - No the other one

    A nutrition study group with The National Restaurant Association will meet later this month to discuss several things, including nutriti...

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