In the future, larger restaurant, café and snack chains in England will have to state exactly how many calories their food and drinks contain.

The law that came into force on Wednesday obliges all catering establishments with more than 250 employees to label their food and soft drinks in this way.

The law, passed last year and applicable only in England, is part of Boris Johnson's British government's measures to combat obesity in the population.

But it has also drawn criticism.

It is said that almost two thirds of adults and one in three school children are overweight.



Philip Pickert

Business correspondent based in London.

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The UK Department of Health has described obesity as "one of the country's biggest health problems".

Clear food labeling would help people make better choices.

Some restaurant and fast food companies are already publishing calorie information.

The Wetherspoons chain of bars and the Real Greek restaurants do this, and McDonald's, KFC and Pizza Hut also post lists.

Others, however, are less than happy about the new requirements.

The founder of the small chain Mowgli Street Food, Nisha Katona, who runs eleven restaurants, complained when the new law was announced that it meant significant additional costs for him.

"It's thousands of pounds and a lot of work," he said.

Especially in view of the pandemic losses in the industry, he thought it was the wrong decision.

The chair of the hospitality industry, UK Hospitality, Kate Nicholls, castigated the new rules, saying they came “at the worst possible time” for the hospitality industry, in which thousands of businesses were struggling to survive.

Culinary impoverishment

Meanwhile, renowned chef Sven-Hanson Britt, winner of the Masterchef competition, fears the calorie labeling requirement will lead to culinary impoverishment.

The new regulation is "a terrible thing for the restaurant industry," says the chef at the Oxeye gourmet restaurant in London.

The regulation “is likely to end creativity and spontaneity and will result in cooking that is just ticking boxes”.

Children would only look at the number of calories in restaurants, said the former Ritz chef.

Criticism also comes from the organization Beat, which represents people with eating disorders.

Chairman Tom Quinn said he was "extremely disappointed".

For people with eating disorders such as anorexia (anorexia) or bulimia (hovering between binge eating and throwing up), calorie counts on menus are an added burden because they reinforce their calorie fixation and guilt.

According to Quinn, there are more than a million people in the UK with eating disorders.

Polls by Public Health England (PHE) show that 79 per cent of the population approve of the new calorie labeling requirement on menus.

PHE said obesity-related diseases cost over £6 billion a year.

Prime Minister Boris Johnson has been campaigning for the fight against obesity since contracting the virus two years ago.

The doctors explained to him at the time that being overweight during his infection period was an aggravating factor.