In the study, which was conducted before the official implementation of the NG labelling system, the research team recruited 138 participants to shop for groceries in their experimental online grocery store called NUSMart. “Our work was designed to assess whether the NG system might help combat this problem.”
“Singapore now has the highest prevalence of diabetes among developed countries,” said Professor Eric Finkelstein from Duke-NUS’ Health Services and Systems Research (HSSR) programme and senior author of the study. The NG label complements the Healthier Choice Symbol currently displayed on selected food and drink items, which aims to help consumers make informed purchases and pave the road to reducing the currently increasing levels of non-communicable diseases such as cancer, diabetes, heart disease, etc.-an epidemic that Singapore shares with many other countries. The new front-of-pack NG system currently grades pre-packed beverages on a four-point scale, from A (lowest in sugar and saturated fat) to D (highest in sugar and saturated fat). Instituted by the Singapore government in December 2022, the colour-coded NG labelling system was introduced to help consumers identify healthier drinks.
