WSJ:  November 24, 2003:  Carbohydrate Confusion

Carbohydrate Confusion

Eager to exploit the latest diet trend, food companies are cooking up a menu of products for people who want to avoid carbohydrates. Reduced-carb versions of everything from ice cream and bread to tortillas and jelly beans are showing up on store shelves, including products from major companies such as H.J. Heinz Co. and Anheuser-Busch Cos.

The problem is, there is no set definition of "low carb."

That's because the Food and Drug Administration, which regulates health claims food marketers can make on their packaging, has never settled on guidelines for what constitutes "low carbohydrate" foods, as it has with other nutrition claims such as "low fat." The agency has sent letters to some companies in the last few years warning that their "low carb" claims are illegal.

Lester Crawford, deputy FDA commissioner, says the agency isn't going after foods that are naturally low in carbohydrates, like meat and vegetables, but rather companies that claim their products have low or no carbohydrates based on their own definition (see related article¹).

"If you put on your label that it's low carbohydrate and we chemically test it and it's high carbohydrate, it's outrageous," he says. The agency's own definition for low-carb nutritional claims "hasn't been adjudicated yet."

WHAT'S IN A CARB?   2 The Good, the Bad and the High Glycemic 3

But that's the problem, food marketers say: When is it "outrageous" to use the term low carb? Seeking to clear up the confusion, the Grocery Manufacturers of America, an industry lobbying group whose members ring up more than $500 billion annually in sales, says it will ask the agency to create guidelines for when foods can legally be promoted as "low carb."

One of the first companies the FDA went after was Atkins Nutritionals Inc., which grew out of the late Dr. Robert Atkins's widely recognized low-carbohydrate diet.

Initially the company counted only certain kinds of carbohydrates in its nutritional labels on packages of snack bars, baking mixes and other products, leaving out ingredients like fiber, sugar alcohols and glycerine, which the company says have minimal effect on blood sugar levels. The FDA met with Atkins Nutritionals in the summer of 2001 and made it list both the total carbohydrates and the "net carbs" on its packages, the company says.

"Our carbs line in some products went from 3 grams to 23 grams," says Colette Heimowitz, vice president of education and research at Atkins Health and Medical Information Services, the research arm of Atkins Nutritionals and the one that provides advice to dieters. But the company believes that "net carbs" are what really matter to people following its diet. To comply with the FDA, Atkins products avoid using the term "low carb." But it has trademarked the slogan "the original low carb lifestyle."

Other companies that received FDA warning letters have adjusted the wording on their package labels. Universal Nutrition Inc. changed its Doctor's Diet LowCarb products to Doctor's CarbRite Diet products, and added the tagline "for carb conscious dieters." The FDA's Dr. Crawford says the agency is "evaluating" that and other labels, and he adds that it makes decisions on individual company's nutritional claims on a case-by-case basis.

Even before it got an FDA letter in July, Flowers Foods Inc. changed its Nature's Own "Reduced Carbohydrate" bread to "Wheat 'n Fiber."

And Kurtis Nielsen, president of closely held Pure Delite Products Inc., says his company stopped describing its candy, cookies and other foods as "low carb" after it heard from the FDA in April. It also stopped omitting maltitol from its total carbohydrate count after the FDA warned that the substance "must be included in the value declared for 'total carbohydrate.' "

The company still offers a special "effective carbs" area in its label that has fiber and sugar alcohols subtracted out. "People have to kind of read between the lines" on his products' packaging now, Mr. Nielsen says.

Other companies are still battling with the FDA. Carbolite Foods Inc., an Evansville, Ind., maker of chocolate bars, soft-serve ice-cream mix and other products, specifies total carbs and net effective carbs on its label, but the FDA contends that the company's name itself constitutes an illegal claim. The "nutrient content claim lite ... does not extend to lite in carbohydrate," the FDA told the company.

Carbolite has petitioned the agency for permission to keep using its name, which, it argues, is accurate because its foods have reduced sugar.

But that request has sparked sharp reactions from major companies like the U.S. arm of Switzerland's Nestlé SA, as well as trade groups representing the chocolate industry and others. "Allowing the exclusive use of carbohydrate terms by a single company is unfair," cereal maker General Mills Inc. said in a letter opposing Carbolite. In January, FDA rejected the petition. Carbolite has appealed.

Not everyone in the industry is afraid to call their products low carb. In January, Russell Stover Candies Inc. launched a line of candies with "Low Carb" emblazoned in purple on red packaging and a carb calculation on the back. (Its toffee squares, for example, have 16.1 grams of total carbs per serving, but only 0.4 "net carbs" when 15.3 grams of maltitol, a sugar alcohol, and 0.4 grams of fiber are omitted.) Chuck Teeter, vice president of quality for Russell Stover, says the company is unconcerned about getting a letter from the FDA: "They came here several months ago and left with some packaging. We haven't heard from them since then, so we think they have no problems."

The FDA's Dr. Crawford declined to comment on Russell Stover's products. But he said the agency is taking a closer look at the role of carbohydrates in diets and welcomes an industry petition to jump-start the process.

If it doesn't receive a petition, the FDA will consider creating guidelines that could come out early next year as part of the agency's anti-obesity initiative, he said. "The American people in the marketplace are demanding labeling like this," he says. "It is up to the FDA to create a safe harbor, to say to the industry, 'this is what's acceptable,' and that's the phase we're in."

Until then, some major food companies are wary about using the term "low carb" at all. "We would look to the FDA on this for guidance," says Pat Verduin, senior vice president of product quality and development at ConAgra Foods Inc., which sells Butterball turkeys and Healthy Choice meals. The company has low-carbohydrate products, but doesn't market them that way. "It's illegal for us to use the term 'low carb,' " he says.

Kraft Foods Inc., which already sells some low-carbohydrate foods, such as sugar-free Jello and cheese, plans to introduce specially marketed low-carb products soon. But "until that's defined, we're not using the term 'low carb,' " says Michael Mudd, a spokesman.

Heinz, which last month announced it would make a low-carb ketchup, isn't using the term, either. Instead, it's "One Carb Ketchup," because it has one gram of carbohydrates per serving, instead of the four grams the regular version gets from tomatoes and high-fructose corn syrup. The low-carb product is made with sucralose, a sugar replacement.

Hain Celestial Group Inc. recently launched a line of low-carbohydrate pastas and snacks, but dubbed the products "Carb Fit."

Meanwhile, some companies that are using the term aren't regulated by the FDA. In December 2001, Anheuser-Busch launched its Michelob Ultra beer, labeled as a "low carbohydrate light beer." Beer is generally overseen by the Treasury Department's Alcohol and Tobacco, Tax and Trade Bureau. That agency says it hasn't defined the term "low-carb," but approved the Michelob label. And just last week Adolph Coors Co. announced it will market its own low-carb brew.

Write to Anna Wilde Mathews at anna.mathews@wsj.com⁹ and Sarah Ellison at sarah.ellison@wsj.com¹⁰

Updated November 24, 2003 1:13 a.m.