Walking down the aisle of any grocery store today, you’ll see a wide variety of packaging promising different things like “all natural,” “low fat,” or “healthy for the heart.” Many of these claims, while persuasive and performing their intended job of convincing a consumer to buy the product, are misleading. The average American consumer faces a wall of confusing, contradictory health information from the internet and the grocery stores they shop at. As obesity and diet-related disease rates continue to be on the rise, there needs to be a call for corporate food labeling reform, instituting policies that make packaging more accurate, transparent, and science-based. Food labeling has the potential to fill in the gaps of nutritional education, reshaping behavior through better information at the actual point of purchase. However, with the current state of labeling, without clear standards and no strong enforcement, the current labels blur the lines between marketing and the truth each and every consumer deserves.

Modern food labeling in the U.S. began with the Nutrition Labeling and Education Act of 1990, requiring nutrition fact panels on packaged foods. With an increasing number of consumers wanting to have the nutritional details of the food they consumed, the goal was to help consumers make healthier choices. However, over the years, there have been loopholes and vague definitions that have weakened its ability to make food labels transparent. For example, terms such as “natural,” “light,” and “made with whole grains” have no actual federal meaning. The Food and Drug Administration does not strictly regulate their use, allowing companies to promote heavily processed foods as healthy.

A 2023 study in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine found that nearly 60 percent of products labeled with health-related terms contained high levels of sugar, saturated fats, or sodium. As a result, labels designed to guide people are now contributing to confusion and misinformation.

Many countries use a front-of-package labeling system that presents simple, visible nutrition information. Chile, for example, uses bold black warning symbols for products with high salt, sugar, or fat percentages. Researchers found that after being introduced in 2016, this policy dropped the sale of sugary drinks by 24 percent in 18 months, with similar systems being present in Mexico, Israel, and the U.K.

The United States, however, still uses voluntary front-label schemes such as the Grocery Manufacturers Association’s “Facts Up Front” initiative, where these labels are inconsistently applied and designed for marketing appeal over clarity. A 2024 Harvard School of Public Health study concluded that color-coded front labels can significantly reduce calorie and sodium intake at the national level, yet no such initiatives have been made by the Food and Drug Administration.

Change and real reform must start with standardizing health claims, removing ambiguity between terms like “natural,” “light,” and “whole grain,” with stronger oversight to prevent misleading imagery like cartoons and colorful packaging. Researchers also suggest that federal law should require front-of-package labels, alongside expanding the Food and Drug Administration’s authority to monitor labels, which could make enforcement more consistent and reliable.

A large-scale labeling reform is not just about spreading information; it’s about reshaping how people go about and think about the food they are consuming, that being able to trust labels and packaging and understand the food they are consuming. Without this movement, the grocery store will remain a space where profit overshadows public health. Transparency in packaging is one of the most direct and affordable ways to improve the nation’s diet, yet it depends on policymakers taking a step in public health away from large corporations and choosing clarity over corporate influence.