Exploring the potential impact of the proposed UK TV and online food advertising regulations: a concept mapping study.

OBJECTIVES: In July 2020 the UK Government announced an intention to restrict advertisements for products high in fat, salt or sugar on live broadcast, catch-up and on-demand television before 21:00 hours; and paid for online advertising. As no other jurisdiction has implemented similar regulations, there is no empirical evidence about how they might perturb the food system. To guide the regulations' implementation and evaluation, we aimed to develop a concept map to hypothesise their potential consequences for the commercial food system, health and society. METHODS: We used adapted group concept mapping in four virtual workshops with food marketing and regulation experts across academia, civil society, government organisations, and industry (n=14), supported by Miro software. We merged concepts derived from the four workshops to develop a master map and then invited feedback from participants via email to generate a final concept map. RESULTS: The concept map shows how the reactions of stakeholders to the regulations may reinforce or undermine the impact on the commercial food system, health and society. The map shows adaptations made by stakeholders that could reinforce, or undermine, positive impacts on public health. It also illustrates potential weaknesses in the design and implementation of the regulations that could result in little substantial difference to public health. CONCLUSIONS: Prior to the regulations' initial implementation or subsequent iterations, they could be altered to maximise the potential for reinforcing adaptations, minimise the potential for undermining adaptations and ensure they cover a wide range of advertising opportunities and foods. The concept map will also inform the design of an evaluation of the regulations and could be used to inform the design and evaluation of similar regulations elsewhere.

Are food and drink available in online and physical supermarkets the same? A comparison of product availability, price, price promotions and nutritional information.

OBJECTIVE: Online supermarkets are increasingly used both by consumers and as a source of data on the food environment. We compared product availability, nutritional information, front-of-pack (FOP) labelling, price and price promotions for food and drink products between physical and online supermarkets. DESIGN: For physical stores, we collected data on price, price promotions, FOP nutrition labels and nutrition information from a random sample of food and drinks from six UK supermarkets. For online stores, we used foodDB, a research-ready dataset of over 14 million observations of food and drink products available in online supermarkets. SETTING: Six large supermarket stores located near Oxford, UK. PARTICIPANTS: General sample with 295 food and drink products, plus boost samples for both fruit and vegetables, and alcohol. RESULTS: In the general sample, 85 % (95 % CI 80, 90 %) of products found in physical stores could be matched with an online product. Nutritional information found in the two settings was almost identical, for example, concordance correlation coefficient for energy = 0·995 (95 % CI 0·993, 0·996). The presence of FOP labelling and price promotions differed between the two settings (Cohen's kappa = 0·56 (95 % CI 0·45, 0·66) and 0·40 (95 % CI 0·26, 0·55), respectively). Prices were similar between online and physical supermarkets (concordance correlation coefficient > 0·9 for all samples). CONCLUSIONS: Product availability, nutritional information and prices sourced online for these six retailers are good proxies of those found in physical stores. Price promotions and FOP labelling vary between the two settings. Further research should investigate whether this could impact on health inequalities.