cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ca/post/42020156
Can Canada create a food labeling system similar to this?
It’s confusing trying to buy Canadian with all the variations of made in, assembled in, grown in, packaged in, etc. Can we copy the Australian food labeling system, perhaps replacing the kangeroo with a maple leaf? I find this much clearer.
That mountain has weirdly shaped hiking trails. They don’t even connect!
You have to look at it upside down
We also had a hard time finding the route. There are narrow paths not shown in the map.
Its a grouse’s head. The beak is to the right.
I love our labelling so much in Australia. Nutrition and origin. The only crap one is health star which is misleading. I occasionally buy NZ products and think we should be closer to an economic union like the EU but their labelling is much worse and I worry that they repackage products of different origin which hurts their reputation for the sake of some quick profits.
Is this for real, do they really have this? You’re winning Australia, don’t let this stuff go.
sure do :)
(also pure coincidence i grabbed just about the most aussie thing in my kitchen, it’s 2am here)
Do you guys get free or close to free healthcare too? That rating and palm oil label is interesting. In the US, they seriously don’t tell you if your chicken is chlorinated, even the organic.
We pay for it with taxes so it’s not really free but yeah, the Medicare system means you don’t pay for hospital visits. Plenty of people still chose to get private health insurance but it’s more of a luxury than anything I think.
I broke my collarbone in two places just yesterday, currently in a hospital bed and will potentially get surgery this afternoon and don’t expect to pay much at all, it’s a good system.
(Shout out to St Vincents in Melbourne!)
We pay for it with taxes so it’s not really free
I keep seeing other countries say this. I don’t think you guys realize that we pay for healthcare with our taxes too, but it’s to pay back the Emergency Room visits by the poor because the hospital can’t turn you away. Of course, the hospitals then raise the rates for those to astronomical prices. It would be way cheaper to have universal healthcare.
I’m so glad there are places that have it and I hope you recover quickly.
A lot of the deficiencies with Australian health care are due to tight budget control. Insufficient staffing etc. Health care is expensive but I believe our government health care spending is less per person than the US despite having a more equitable system.
Some of the cost pressures on our system are likely due to increasing use of private services. You can feel the dream of universal health and education slipping away here as bits are carved off for the private sector.
That’s how they get you to switch to what the US has, slowly carve it away. I hope you hold onto it.
Universal healthcare is cheaper, but still not really free healthcare.
Free (at point of use) is what people are meaning when they say that.
You’re right, it would be cheaper healthcare and we wouldn’t have bills come in on top of that. To the simple people who are voting against this, I will call it free healthcare.
we call cultural events put on by the government free events, so i think it’s fair to say that if you go to hospital, get surgery, and leave without paying anything that’s considered free… it costs no more to you to use the healthcare system than not, thus free in many more senses of the word than the narrow definition of paid for in taxes
I don’t want to disagree but we also pay for public television, like a mandatory netflix subscription. You could say it doesn’t cost anything to watch a show, just like it doesn’t cost anything to go to the doctor but it doesn’t feel fair to me to call them free services because they are not gifts or something like that. We also don’t have free highways, free pensions or free education. If everyone would consider them free things you have the right to use because you are a citizen people will probably complain a lot more about taxes than when this people consider themselves taxpayers who organised themselves to get things done for a fair price.
Hopefully a speedy recovery, that sounds like a sore one!
Public hospital care is free and very good in my experience but we have a mixed public/private system and there is usually a gap between private fees and public compensation. So for most people going to a doctor or specialist isn’t free (it can be but generally isn’t) but it is subsidised.
Prescriptions are the biggest win. Trump wants to take those away. It will be over my dead body.
They sure do! I’m in NZ and buy more Australia Made stuff than NZ Made because most if the NZ Made was just packaged here but the labelling is unclear.
I’d love to get this labelling for NZ products.
Commented this elsewhere as an Aussie. It makes a quick buck for some NZ business person but it kills your reputation. Great country. Should be great products. I would buy 100% made in NZ above anything but local. It’s crazy not to promote local content when you have such a strong national brand.
There used to be (maybe still is) a “Made in NZ” label. But I am not sure if it’s not around anymore or there just isn’t much that you could say is 100% NZ made.
E.g. most of our “Made in NZ” bacon is made from Canadian or European pork. Made in NZ from 1% NZ ingredients.
I love the Aussie labels because I would definitely buy based on the ingredients being mostly NZ origin rather than just whether some processing happened here.
Also don’t let go of your “standard drink” stuff on the side of piss. I loved that while I was there. Sure I can guess how much alcohol I’ve had in the last couple hours by reckoning my 3 or 4 beers had 5%, 6.5%x2, and 8% and this means I’m tipsy. But it’s so much easier to understand how drunk I am when it’s 1+1.5+1.5+2=6 standard drinks.
It’s just a good system despite the many flaws.
Firstly we need some labels on US food items. Perhaps something like this:
Removed by mod
Abandoned hope, ye who enter here.
As an Australian, I’d also be happy for this. Even after winding the tariffs back, trump is still a Nazi and as long as he’s winning votes, the US can’t be supported
Id rather buy EU too
I would love something like this. I would however want it to somehow also portray the nationality of the owner.
The product may be 100% grown and produced in the EU, but be 100% american owned. Maybe I’d rather the product be 90% EU produced, if I could also be sure it’s 100% EU owned.
Haha no, but we have NutriScore where sweetened Nestle products get an A, frozen pizza gets a B and cheese gets an F.
…that’s not how those work.
If a frozen pizza gets a B that means compared to OTHER frozen pizzas it has a higher nutritional value.
It compares similar products for nutritional value, not the overall “healthiness” of all products compared with each other.
So you can compare a salami pizza with a veggie pizza or a cereal bar with cereals, but not a strawberry yogurt with a chocolate bar, because those are not within the same product group.
It’s true but at the same time the fact that so many people get that system wrong makes me think maybe it’s not that well thought through. These things need to be intuitive.
Oh yeah it’s confusing labeling, I agree.
In Finland, we have “heart label” (Sydänmerkki). The label has text “better choice”, and it’s intended to inform customers about products that are good for heart health. You can find this label pretty much on any product category, including things like cookies, ice cream and pizza. You are expected to know, that the label actually means “better choice for heart health within this product category”. So yea, I agree with you on that intuitive part.
Australia also have a similar health star rating.
https://nutritionaustralia.org/fact-sheets/food-label-reading-guide/#Health-Star-Ratings
Coco pops has a health star rating of 2 out 0f 5
Rolled oats are 5 stars
I guess at least this way there’s a greater incentive for companies to make their product applicable for the label
That’s legit the first time I hear it, and I searched nutriscore on the internet when I first saw these odd labels, and read some article about it, so likely more research than most people.
Do you have a source for this, because my understanding of the Wikipedia page is that you’re not correct, but I’m also aware of my ignorance in this topic.
Under “Goals” on the Wikipedia page.
Its goal is to allow consumers to compare the overall nutritional value of food products from the same group (category), including food products from different manufacturers.
But, I agree that it’s confusing. The fact that you could miss the point of them even after skimming the Wikipedia shows how flawed their design is by not explaining it in simple terms on the label. And the Wikipedia page is also bad, why is it not mentioned in the first sentence in the introduction part?
- 1 here. I think it compares fats carbs and stuff. I don’t think it weights by product type…
Sounds like a simple labeling update would fix the confusion. All labels should say “Rated B compared to other options among FOOD GROUPING.”
Or something. I’m sure it would be doable.
It compares similar products for nutritional value, not the overall “healthiness” of all products compared with each other.
Yes, but nobody knows that, they don’t teach it in school, and people just ignore it anyway because it seems unreliable.
I’ve seen the explanation on tv once or twice but I agree, it’s confusing.
That sounds like the kind of system the food industry would lobby for to intentionally confuse their customers.
Goddamn brilliant!
I’d be honest, I think they should keep the bar and “made in Australia” but remove the text. The additional text is just ugly and looks bad than no label at all in some cases.
