Posted October 28, 2014 by Jodi Hillman
Food Scores from Environmental Working Group
The Environmental Working Group launched a website titled Food Scores, which gives packaged food rankings from 1 to 10. With the ranking system, 1 is the best and 10 is the worst. The rankings are based on nutritional information and ingredients. The website aims to provide consumers with information based on how processed the food is.
The director of the Environmental Working Group, Renee Sharp, said “We know that consumers care a lot about what’s in the food they buy, and we know what foods are highly processed, that can have an impact on nutrition in ways that don’t always show up on the information panels on labels.”
Searching for a product on Food Scores is simple. Just type in the product you are looking for and it pulls up a list of brand name selections. Each product has a number ranking it from 1 to 10. Click on a product and more detail pops up. A detailed list is shown on whether the product has additives to be concerned about, the amount of processing, and whether or not it is organic. It also has a complete list of ingredients as well as nutritional information.
Renee Sharp said “You can see if a product is gluten-free, whether it potentially contains genetically modified ingredients, and how it stacks up against its competition. The database is only of branded package products.”
As consumers become more and more health conscious, websites like Food Scores are popping up around the web. A yogurt scorecard by Cornucopia Institute will be released soon scoring yogurts based on how nutritious they are. The co-founder of Cornucopia says some yogurts have as much added sugars as candy bars. Similarly, Skin Deep is a website with a similar idea just for cosmetics.
