Why don't all products with 5-a-day on the packaging show up on Nutracheck?

The principle behind 5-a-day is to get us all eating more fresh fruit and vegetables. Ideally this should be fruit and veg in its natural state – not part of a processed product that has had other ingredients added. However we do recognise that it's not always easy to just eat fresh, dried or frozen fruit and veg, so fruit and veg within other foods such as cereal bars can count towards our 5-a-day.

The NHS 5-a-day guidelines say that certain processed foods can count towards your 5-a-day (if the quantity of ingredient complies – a portion is around 80g of the fresh fruit, and 30g dried), but they also state that ready meals for example should be eaten in moderation because of the other ingredients that will have been added, such as fat and salt. Further information can be here.

In a quest to highlight positive health benefits of processed products, manufacturers and retailers may highlight that an item contains one of your 'fruit & veg portions' – although the official 5-a-day logo cannot be used on packaging unless the product fully complies with the NHS guidelines. The good news is that many of the major retailers in the UK also have strict criteria about when a 5-a-day logo can be used, so in general if any logo or statement is on pack, then this usually means that you will find 'a portion' within the food. While it is good that the product contains some fruit or vegetables, it is still a better option to just eat pure fruit or vegetables with no extra ingredients such as salt, sugar or saturated fat.

At present, our policy at Nutracheck is based on the purist view of supporting the principle of 5-a-day. You will find that the 5-a-day symbol shows on fresh fruit and vegetables, dried fruits, pulses etc – basically the natural foods, but it may not show on other products.

The reason is that we don't want members to become overly reliant on eating processed products to achieve their 5-a-day intake as this kind of dilutes the principle of the 5-a-day initiative. Remember that you should be getting a good variety (or a rainbow!) of different fruits and vegetables to make up your 5 a day – fresh, frozen, dried, juiced and canned all count.