Australians are more worried about food safety and quality than five years ago, believe what is added to food is harmful to our health, actively try to choose foods with no or fewer additives, believe food processing and pesticides are a major risk and if the price was the same, would prefer to buy organic food, according to the Jalna Australian Food Attitudes Survey, conducted by Newspoll.

“Despite the fact Australia’s food supply is one of the safest in the world and is well regulated in every respect from growing to food preparation, we remain concerned about the possibility of negative impacts of food on our health,” said Karen Inge*, Accredited Practising Dietitian.

“The Jalna Australian Food Attitudes Survey questioned a representative national sample of 1201 adults by telephone and found surprisingly high levels of concern about what we eat every day and that Australians clearly want foods with no additives and minimal processing,” said Karen Inge.

The Newspoll Jalna Australian Food Attitudes Survey found:

• 52% reported they are more concerned about the safety and quality of food in Australia compared to five years ago, while only 6% are less concerned.
  
  
• Key areas of concern identified as the biggest potential hazards to the safety and quality of our food are food processing, handling and freshness (identified by 35% of respondents); sprays like pesticides plus additives and preservatives (23%) as well as concerns about imported food, particularly because of unknown safety standards and regulations (12%).
  
  
• Despite greater awareness of the health implications of too much fat, salt or sugar in the diet, only 3% identified these as the biggest potential hazard to the safety and quality of our food, with similar figures across all age groups.
  

This is surprising because when asked which ingredients they are very conscious of checking for on labels:

• 76% reported consciously checking for fat content
  
• 74% consciously checked for sugar content and
  

• 62% consciously checked for salt content

Australian Health Concerns

• 73% believe additives and preservatives are generally harmful to your health.
  
  
• 79% believe artificial food colourings can cause behavioural or learning difficulties such as attention deficit disorder or hyperactivity in children.
  
  
• Not surprisingly, 75% stated they actively try to buy foods that contain no or fewer additives.
  
  
• 59% of respondents believe that many foods contain a high level of pesticide residue, while
  
  
• 84% stated that if organic food was the same price as conventional food, they would prefer to buy organic food.
  
  
• One significant finding from a nutrition perspective is that Australians are far more concerned about additives than they are about kilojoule content (possibly one of the factors in Australia’s burgeoning weight problems).
  
  Only 46% of respondents reported they are very conscious of checking food labels for the kilojoule content; whereas 63% are very conscious of checking for additives in general; 63% check for preservatives; 59% check for artificial sweeteners; 57% check for artificial colours and 57% check for artificial flavours.

According to Karen Inge, if Australians can be encouraged to start reading labels more carefully to see just what is in what we’re eating, and make healthy choices – like Jalna yoghourt - that are as close to the natural source as possible, and choose less processed foods with fewer additives and lower fat, salt and sugar products, we will be moving in the right direction.
 
The Jalna Australian Food Attitudes Survey was conducted for Jalna Dairy Foods because Jalna believe Australians are concerned about additives and wanted to establish how important this issue is, as part of the launch of new Jalna Low Fat Vanilla Creamy Yoghourt in 500g tubs.

Like all Jalna Yoghourt, it is naturally ‘pot set’, so contains no added gelatine, starches or food acids, no cane sugar, artificial sweeteners or colours and no preservatives, unlike many mass-produced yoghourts, is low GI and gluten free.

A 200g serve of any Jalna Yoghourt supplies over six hundred million probiotic count of aBc (La-5® Lactobacillus acidophilus, BB-12® bifidobacterium, Lc-01® Lactobacillus Casei) strains of probiotics – more than the daily amount used in research with demonstrated health benefits.)

Jalna is Australian owned and made.

*Karen Inge is a consultant dietitian to Jalna Dairy Foods