THE CASE OF THE REDACTED BREAKFAST CEREAL BOXES

[defrog]

Not long ago, I saw this in the breakfast cereal section of the new supermarket at the far end of the village:



I took a photo because – me being me – I found the cover design simultaneously creepy yet hilarious (“trio of flakes, twigs and granola”, indeed).

It wasn’t until later that I noticed the white label covering the text. Upon investigating, I noticed that much of the text had been redacted CIA-style.



Then I noticed other cereals had redacted text.



Since I could detect the text under the label, I was able to work out the reason: they were covering up nutritional claims. The Good Friends one, for example, should be “High Fiber Cereal” with “46% daily value fiber”.

It’s all to do with an amendment to a new nutrition-labeling law that took effect in HK on July 1 that basically says, don’t make nutrition claims you can’t back up on yr packaging. In otrher words, it’s not enough for the nutrition info to be labeled according to local regs – the nutrition blurbs have to be supported as well.

Apparently, one way around that is to redact the packaging text.

Anyway, after July 1, the store has put up signs explaining all this. But clearly the workaround has been in place well before the law kicked in.



More on the labeling controvery here and here, if yr interested. (And I can’t see why you would be, but please yrselves.)

PRODUCTION NOTE: Poor-quality images shot with a Nokia E52 phone in a hurried and clandestine nature. All prices are in Hong Kong dollars (in case you thought a box of Honey Nut Cheerios goes for US$64.00 here). 

Need-to-know basis,

This is dF

Comments

[nykeyoung.livejournal.com]

Well, that's very [REDACTED]