Mintel’s Consumer Food Labelling report provides an in-depth analysis of labelling.

Highlights of the report include:

• Consumer awareness of origin has been steadily growing – as a result of wider general interest in food and health, animal disease outbreaks and celebrity chef campaigns – and politicians have adopted the cause with pledges to support the British farming industry
• Within origin labelling, demand for local sourcing is gaining momentum, and was viewed as important by almost three tenths of consumers in Mintel’s research
• Campaigners for origin labelling take issue with the legislative loophole allowing manufacturers to, for example, import meat from another country and process it either as a value added cut or within a composite product labelled as ‘British’
• In early 2009, environment secretary Hilary Benn called for retailers to stop labelling imported meat as British, and said that the government was lobbying the EC to tighten up its rules
• Demand for country of origin Labelling is not exclusive to the retail sector, with many British food organisations campaigning for greater provenance in foodservice
• Origin is increasingly flagged up on food packaging as a means of offering greater transparency to consumers
• Older, educated and affluent shoppers show greater interest in food labelling but are often left confused