Summary United Nations (UN) organizations have urged governments to restrict the marketing of unhealthy food and nonalcoholic beverage products to children. This study conducted an accountability evaluation for the International Food & Beverage Alliance's (IFBA's) Global Policy on Marketing Communications to Children (Global Policy) compared with UN and other best‐practice recommendations. We used the National Academy of Medicine's LEAD (ie, locate, evaluate, assemble evidence to inform decisions) framework to identify evidence (January 2004 to October 2018). We assigned a progress score (ie, none, limited, some, extensive) for five accountability steps. No progress was made to appoint an empowered body to evaluate IFBA's Global Policy. IFBA and the Access to Nutrition Foundation made some progress to take and share the account. Diverse actors made no progress to hold IFBA to account for nonadherence or to strengthen accountability structures for future compliance. IFBA could strengthen its Global Policy to align with best practices. UN organizations and other stakeholders should encourage IFBA firms to restrict the marketing of unhealthy foods and beverages to reduce children's obesity risk. This evaluation is relevant to all firms and industry associations that market products to children that undermine their diet and health.

BackgroundEvidence supports that television food advertisements influence children’s food preferences and their consumption. However, few studies have examined the extent and nature of food marketing to children in low and middle income countries. This study aims to assess the nutritional quality of foods and beverages advertised on Mexican TV, applying the Mexican, World Health Organization (WHO) European and United Kingdom (UKNPM) nutrient profile models, before the Mexican regulation on food marketing came into effect.MethodsWe recorded 600 h on the four national public and free TV channels with the highest national ratings, from December 2012 to April 2013. Recordings were done for 40 randomly selected (week, weekend, school and vacation) days, from 7 am to 10 pm. Nutritional information per 100 g/ml of product was obtained from the product labels or company websites.ResultsA total of 2,544 food and non-alcoholic beverage advertisements were broadcast, for 275 different products. On average, the foods advertised during cartoon programming had the highest energy (367 kcal) and sugar (30.0 g) content, while foods advertised during sport programming had the highest amount of total fat (9.5 g) and sodium (412 mg) content. More than 60 % of the foods advertised did not meet any nutritional quality standards. 64.3 % of the products did not comply with the Mexican nutritional standards, as compared with 83.1 % and 78.7 % with WHO Europe and UKNPM standards, respectively. The food groups most frequently advertised were beverages (24.6 %), followed by chocolate and confectionery sugar (19.7 %), cakes, sweet biscuits and pastries (12.0 %), savory snacks (9.3 %), breakfast cereals (7.1 %), ready-made food (6.4 %) and dairy products (6.0 %).ConclusionThe majority of foods and beverages advertised on Mexican TV do not comply with any nutritional quality standards, and thus should not be marketed to children. The nutritional quality standards applied by the Mexican regulation are much weaker than those applied by the WHO Europe and United Kingdom. The Mexican government should improve the nutrition standards in its new regulation, especially the sugar cut off points.Electronic supplementary materialThe online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s12889-016-3298-0) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

There is insufficient evidence that restaurant menu labeling policies are cost-effective strategies to reduce obesity and diet-related non-communicable diseases (NCDs). Evidence suggests that menu labeling has a modest effect on calories purchased and consumed. No review has been published on the effect of menu labeling policies on transnational restaurant chains globally. This study conducted a two-step scoping review to map and describe the effect of restaurant menu labeling policies on menu reformulation. First, we identified national, state, and municipal menu labeling policies in countries from global databases. Second, we searched four databases (i.e., PubMed, CINHAL/EBSCO, Web of Science, and Google Scholar) for peer-reviewed studies and gray-literature sources in English and Spanish (2000–2020). Step 1 identified three voluntary and eight mandatory menu labeling policies primarily for energy disclosures for 11 upper-middle and high-income countries, but none for low- or middle-income countries. Step 2 identified 15 of 577 studies that met the inclusion criteria. The analysis showed reductions in energy for newly introduced menu items only in the United States. We suggest actions for governments, civil society organizations, and the restaurant businesses to develop, implement, and evaluate comprehensive menu labeling policies to determine whether these may reduce obesity and NCD risks worldwide.

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It is of critical importance that the regulating authorities and the Ministry of Health, implement criteria that guarantee the compliance of recommendations promulgated in official documents. As well as the standarization of the percentage of recommended sugar intake based on WHO standards or lower considering the epidemiological alert for diabetes that the country is experiencing.