New Health Star Rating Website Helps Consumers and Food Industry

The Public Health Association of Australia (PHAA) has welcomed the establishment of the website to facilitate the new Health Star Rating on food.
Michael Moore, the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the PHAA (who was also co-chair of the Technical Design Working Group developing the rating system) said, “Industry will now be able to provide clear information to consumers on the nutritional content of the food that they purchase and consume.  "The Health Star Rating system will also provide a valuable guide for parents seeking to make good nutritional choices on what to feed their children.”
Associate Professor Heather Yeatman, President of the PHAA added, “This site will mean that industry will have no difficulty understanding how the system works and will be able to easily apply the new system to their particular product.  When food companies include the star rating on their food products, ordinary people will be able to tell at a glance whether the food they are eating is good for them.  In the same way that people judge a movie, a hotel or a white goods product they will be able to judge food on a rating of half a star through to five stars.”
Associate Professor Yeatman – who is also a senior academic in public health nutrition at the University of Wollongong - added, “This is a major step toward making healthy choices the easy choices.  It is so straightforward – the more stars the healthier the food.”
The site is available at: www.healthstarrating.com.au
“PHAA calls on all sectors of the food industry to prepare to implement the Health Star System on their products as quickly as possible.  Given the extent of the obesity epidemic in Australia and diet related illnesses including diabetes, cancer and cardio-vascular disease there is no time waste. The system has been over two years in the making – improving consumers’ choices will depend on how quickly industry can adopt it,” said Associate Professor Yeatman.
Michael Moore concluded, “This site makes it easy for industry to comply with the new system.  The Health Star Rating system will not solve all of our country’s nutritional issues.  There is no silver bullet for this complex issue.  However, allowing people to easily judge the healthiness of their food is certainly a step in the right direction.  People will be able to understand at a glance just how healthy is the food they are consuming or serving to their families.”