Food labels are about to take a major evolutionary step — instant comprehensibility

Saturday, Jan. 5, 2008 | midnight

The advent of federally mandated nutrition labels on grocery items has helped consumers become more aware of the relationship between food and health.

But individual labels can take a minute or more to read thoroughly, and even the most conscientious shopper is not likely to understand everything listed. As a result, comparison shopping, which is the whole point of nutrition labels, becomes time-consuming and frustrating.

Nutrition labels are destined to improve with time, and that time appears to be near. A guide has been developed that will instantly tell shoppers what they want to know about a product's nutritional value.

The San Francisco Chronicle last week reported on the guide, known as the Overall Nutritional Quality Index, that is coming later this year to Raley's stores in the Bay Area.

Developed by David Katz, director of the Yale-Griffin Prevention Research Center, the guide will use a numerical scale from 1 to 100, with 100 signifying the most nutritional. The research center is part of the Yale School of Medicine, and Katz was given money by Yale's Griffin Hospital to develop his system for rating food.

Katz told the Chronicle he attended a nutritionists' seminar five years ago organized by the federal government, which was seeking a way to help consumers better understand the foods they were buying. No agreement was reached, so Katz said he was inspired to develop his own research group.

A quick, easy-to-understand guide is the first step in the evolution of the nutrition label. The next step, already being planned, will be other grocery chains' coming out with their own quick guides developed by other researchers. Unfortunately, that will leave consumers confused about which guide is the most accurate.

We hope, as a final step, that the federal government convenes another seminar, this time with executives of all the chains using competing guides. One trustworthy guide for all food stores in the country would be the ultimate goal.

For food shoppers, that would be the greatest thing since sliced bread.