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Breakfast drinks make ‘shonky’ claims, Choice

Consumer watchdog, Choice, says many popular liquid breakfast drinks including Sanitarium’s Up & Go are making misleading or ‘shonky’ nutritional claims.

An independent investigation by Choice into 23 different liquid breakfast products has found that claims such as ‘high in fibre’ and ‘good source of protein’ are false, SMH reports.

The research found that many of these liquid breakfast products do not comply with a new food standard that was released in January aiming to regulate nutritional content claims on food labels.

Although companies will have three years to comply with the new standards (which state that for a product to claim that it is a ‘good source of fibre’, it must contain at least four grams of fibre per serve), many are currently falling far below the benchmark.

The popular Sanitarium Up & Go drink was found to contain less than four grams of fibre despite boasting a high fibre content on the label.

Choice says that products containing 20 percent fibre have a very high fibre content, 10 percent is high and products with less than five percent have a low fibre content.

Other popular drinks including Aldi’s Goldenvale Quick Start contains only 2.3 percent fibre, while Dairy Farmers’ Oat Express ranked lowest at only 1.2 percent

"Shonky claims on liquid breakfasts such as 'high in fibre', 'fibre for digestive health', and 'goodness of three grains' is a cause for concern," Choice spokesman Tom Godfrey said.

"Liquid breakfasts have on average 1.5 percent fibre, which is well below the 10 percent benchmark for high fibre.

"It is grains away from the 39.5 percent fibre offered by some bran cereals."

The investigation also discovered that 10 out of the 23 liquid breakfast products examined contained more than 23g of sugar, which is comparable to the average chocolate bar.

"If it's energy you are after, the breakfast drinks Choice reviewed ranged from 700kj to 912kj and fall short of a regular meal that comes in at 2000kj," Godfrey said.

Since its launch over 15 years ago, Sanitarium’s Up & Go has remained the market leader in the liquid breakfast category and has reportedly sold 34m litres through supermarkets in the past 12 months alone.

 

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