Food: MPs want to make the display of the Nutri-Score compulsory | LCP

This Monday, November 4, the deputies adopted an amendment aimed at making the display of the Nutri-Score on foodstuffs compulsory. This measure, passed by way of amendment during the examination of the Social Security financing bill in the National Assembly, could however not appear in the final version of the text, the government being opposed to it.

Make the Nutri-Score mandatory. The National Assembly adopted, this Monday, November 4, during the examination at first reading of the social security financing bill (PLFSS) for the year 2025, two amendments reinforcing this system introduced in France in 2017.

The first plans to make obligatory display of Nutri-Score on foodstuffswhile the second plans to make mandatory display on all advertising media relating to foodstuffs. At this stage of legislative processhowever, there is no guarantee that these two measures will appear in the final version of the Social Security budget.

“THE chronic diseases increase by 4% every year (…) This is why our system [de santé] is in danger“, declared in the hemicycle Cyrille Isaac-Sibille (The Democrats)the author of the two adopted amendments. “The objective of our approach is not to ask the French to give up certain foods, but to inform them about the risks to their health and encourage them to adapt their consumption accordingly” he also wrote in the explanatory statement of one of his amendments.

These measures were notably supported by Jérôme Guedj (Socialists), Hadrien Clouet (Rebellious France) or even Sabrina Sebaihi (Ecologist and social) : “The objective of Nutri-Score is to force producers and the agri-food industry to improve their productsto lower sugar levels“, indicated the MP for Hauts-de-Seine.

European regulations

For his part, the government has expressed its opposition to Cyrille’s amendments Isaac-Sibyls: “The nutri-score is an important element, but current regulations cannot make it compulsorysince it is an element that was committed to European level“, explained the Minister of Health, Geneviève Darrieussecqsaying on the other hand in favor of an evolution of thealgorithm of Nutri-Score, engaged on a European scale since 2023.

Several deputies, like Joëlle Mélin (National Rally) et Thibault Bazin (Republican Right) have, for their part, expressed their doubts about the system proposed by Cyrille Isaac-Sibyls. “If we applied the Nutri-Score to local productsthey would be classified as D or E“, underlined the MP for Meurthe-et-Moselle.

The adoption of these amendments is far from definitive. A possible rejection of the Social Security financing bill, as in committee, would result in their deletion and the PLFSS would be transmitted to the Senate without the provisions adopted by the deputies. And in the event of final adoption of the text by 49.3, the government would be free to withdraw the amendments to which it opposes. “We will not make the nutri-score compulsory, we will follow European directives“also warned Genevieve Darrieussecqa few minutes before the vote of the deputies.