‘Superfoods’ face wrath of EU over marketing claims

COMMONSENSE has never been and never will be fashionable. Just mention the importance of a healthy, balanced diet to somebody and you’ll feel like your GP, your grandmother or, worse still, your mother.

Yet, in one of the great ironies of the Noughties, we have become obsessed with health. The generation who spent most of the ’80s and ’90s lining up G&Ts in Soho and New York wine bars or hoovering up speed in thumping dance clubs now rave about surfing, the triathlon challenge and organic food.

How many times have I choked on sarcastic smiles as some former college mate rants about the evil of supermarkets and how they “only ever eat organic”.

Same girl was once more chemically enhanced than sherbet and loved to breathlessly declare she hadn’t eaten for a week after a weekend coke binge.

Food is now fashion and fashion is food. Not content with designer boobs and babies, you have to be seen to be ingesting the right edibles.

If Angelina Jolie is spotted nibbling while out in public, magazine editors worldwide will be cross-examining her edibles. If some television nutritionist like Gillian McKeith recommends some far-flung berry from the Himalayas, Tesco will have them in stock within weeks. Their health benefits may be hazy but all we need is a big marketing campaign or a celebrity endorsement and their sales are supersonic.

It is for this reason that the European Union (EU) has decided to rail against “superfoods” — the likes of spinach, blueberries, salmon, soya and walnuts which are being declared as laden with antioxidants and omega-3 fatty acids. We’re being told they’ll make us brainier, live longer, have more sex and less likely to fall prey to some nasty terminal illness. Why wouldn’t we flock to the supermarket with those kind of claims?

Listen to one internet testimonial on goji berries: “It’s difficult to believe that such a small berry has the potential to prolong a person’s life for an extended period of time. It is even harder to believe that the Tibetan people have known about the amazing secrets of this ancient berry for many centuries and have kept it hidden from the rest of the world for so long.”

The widespread belief is the berries have more vitamin C than oranges, more beta-carotene than carrots and more iron than steak.

However, the “superfoods” term is to be restricted on product packaging under new EU laws.

The EU is railing against the forces of marketing.

Manufacturers will have to justify their health benefit claims if they want to use the description.

It’s not just superfoods that are under the spotlight — if a food is “low in salt” it will have to meet a standard EU definition to make this claim.

It is a world gone mad when we people on average salaries are on waiting lists for €2,000 Chanel handbags and when the powers-that-be are legislating for stupidity.