Real Food Campaign has criticised upcoming food labelling regulations for not going into enough detail.

The Campaign claims that the Food Information Regulations 2014 (FIR) guidance does not go far enough in informing shoppers about the bread they buy.

Its key concerns around loaf labelling are that:

• Industrial loaves can still be sold without declaring any processing aids
• Previously frozen in-store bakery can still be marketed as ‘fresh’ or ‘freshly baked’
• Unwrapped supermarket loaves can still be sold without any label or written notice of their ingredients and without declaring any artificial additives used

Informed decision

Campaign coordinator Chris Young said: “We believe that the government has missed a golden opportunity to improve customer protection. Shoppers have the right to make fully-informed choices about the loaves they buy, but despite DEFRA giving the food labelling rule book a full overhaul, what we see as gaping loopholes have been left open.

"At least we have the small victory that bread manufacturers must at last declare on loaf labels the token nutrients added to most flour.

“Surely the government could have gone a lot further than the basic EU requirements to protect not only shoppers, but also the small, local, independent Real Bread bakeries that are helping to revive our high streets and providing more skilled craft baking jobs per loaf.”