Can food labels make us healthier?

The Europeans | European news, politics and culture

Katy Lee and Dominic Kraemer

Society & Culture, News

4.8 • 274 Ratings

🗓️ 9 May 2024

⏱️ 46 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Across a fair chunk of Europe, we've grown used to seeing little traffic light symbols on our food packets that supposedly rate the healthiness of our food. But why might Dominic's chamomile tea get a Nutri-Score rating of C, when a diet cola gets an A? And does Giorgia Meloni have a point in claiming that the ratings are biased against Italians? This week we ring up Alie de Boer, an expert on all things food labelling, to demystify the Nutri-Score system once and for all. We're also talking about why Georgia's at a crossroads between Russia and the EU, and why it's such a scary moment in German politics. Alie is an assistant professor of nutrition and food law at Maastricht University's Venlo campus. You can watch her excellent video about Nutri-Score here. This week's Inspiration Station offerings: Marina Abramović's new exhibition and Desert Island Discs interview; Gugelhupf. Thanks for listening! If you enjoy our podcast, we'd love it if you'd consider chipping in a few bucks a month at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠patreon.com/europeanspodcast⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ (many currencies are available). You can also help new listeners find the show by ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠leaving us a review⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ or giving us five stars on Spotify. Other resources for this episode: 'Is Georgian Dream Digging Its Own Grave?' - Transitions, May 2024 https://tol.org/client/article/is-georgian-dream-digging-its-own-grave.html 'Are right-wing populists more likely to justify political violence?' - European Consortium for Political Research, March 2024 https://ejpr.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/1475-6765.12668?af=R 'How Italian "food nationalism" has blocked Nutri-Score nutrition labelling system in Europe' - Mediapart, January 2024 https://www.mediapart.fr/en/journal/international/060124/how-italian-food-nationalism-has-blocked-nutri-score-nutrition-labelling-system-europe 00:23 A delicious, digestible bowl of European news 02:52 Good week: Georgia's brave protesters 09:43 Bad week: German democracy 21:10 Interview: Alie de Boer on how those Nutri-Score labels on your food actually work 37:51 The Inspiration Station: Marina Abramović and gugelhupf 42:52 Happy Ending: The European Seagull Screeching Championship Producers: Morgan Childs and Katy Lee Mixing and mastering: Wojciech Oleksiak Music: Jim Barne and Mariska Martina ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Instagram⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ |⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Threads⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ |⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠Twitter⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ | ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Mastodon⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ | ⁠Bluesky⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠[email protected]⁠

Transcript

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0:00.0	Hello and welcome to the Europeans podcast, your weekly bowl of digestible European news.
0:29.2	That is disgusting. No one's going to want to listen to this podcast after saying that.
0:33.3	There's nothing disgusting about a bowl of news.
0:35.9	People will see in a second why you've described us that way.
0:39.1	But hello, Dominic, from Paris.
0:40.6	You're very far away again.
0:42.1	Yeah, come back, Katie.
0:43.6	I'm back in Paris, but it was really nice, Dominic, to see you last week in person.
0:47.9	We actually got to hang out IRL.
0:49.9	It was a very rare treat.
0:51.2	It was very nice.
0:53.1	Thank you for coming all the way to Amsterdam.
0:54.7	I'm sorry I still haven't been to Paris in like six years.
0:57.7	Not really excusable.
0:59.2	It was very nice indeed.
1:00.3	My baby spent most of the time we were together trying to eat Dominic's hat, which was fun.
1:05.2	But it was very nice to see you and producer cats and a bunch of our listeners.
1:09.7	We had a little meetup for supporters of the show,
1:12.3	and it was really, really nice to be able to put so many faces to names.
1:15.9	Yeah, it was really fun,
1:17.0	and I went away from it feeling like I didn't actually thank them enough in person
1:20.7	for supporting the podcast.
	...

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