Canadian low-carbers left out in the cold?
I am no big fan of low carb food products that try to mimic high-carb foods like bread, candy, pancakes, and countless others. They tend to be highly processed with dubious claims based on the iffy status of sugar alcohols. Nevertheless, the recent decision by Health Canada and the Canadian Food Inspection Agency to outlaw any kinds of supplemental labeling that denotes the Atkins approval or even signaling that the product is low in carbs is, in my opinion, just unfair.
Has labeling signaling the lack of fat (even in nutritionally bereft foods like candy) been banned too? If not, then to be fair, it should be as well. As it stands, manufacturers will have to relabel lots of product and what’s on shelves now will become illegal to sell. Will manufacturers decide that it’s worth it to take the effort to relabel their product and then try to sell it when they can’t even advertise what is admittedly a major selling point for the millions of low-carb dieters out there?
Perhaps the end effect, even if it does strip Canadian consumers of options, is a double-edged sword. Low-carb dieters, especially those fairly new to it and who haven’t bothered to understand the mechanics behind a healthy low-carb plan, often tend to use these products as a crutch to continue to eat the way they feel accustomed to instead of truly adopting a new way of thinking about food and nutrition – a more holistic and natural way that involves few processed foods and mainly whole foods like veggies, fruits, meat, fish, poultry, nuts, etc. On the other hand, these products do have their place as an occasional treat instead of the full-carb alternative. The danger is that consumers see “low-carb” and decide this means they can eat as much as they want, just as consumers did with low-fat products.
What gets me is that these Canadian Agencies just used a U.S.-based entity, the Institute of Medicine (this was the first time I’d heard of them) to make this decision. Not only that but the recommendations from this institute that they are following came out a couple of years ago, before many studies supporting a controlled-carbohydrate regimen were published. So the science backing this not only is unoriginal, and only coming from one point of view, but in addition is old! Plus it almost seems like these agencies are renouncing responsibility for doing any work themselves by using someone else’s recommendation.
The regulations are said to take affect in December of 2005, by which time there will be even more studies out, and the recommendations that are the basis for these regulations will then be over three years old! It will be interesting if, as has happened over the last year or two, even more nutritional and medical experts start looking critically at the old assumptions of carbohydrate-centric diets as the model and decide that there may just be some benefits to controlling carb intake.
Update: Katherine Prouty at Low Carb Fredom also posted a piece about this (thanks for the link, Katherine!), with links to lots of scietific studies that support a reduction in carbs for health and weight loss.
Hi, I live in Quebec, Canada and yes we, Canadian low-carber are left
witout options and I am very very angry and desapointed with my gov. We
are certainly the only country in the world with that kind of regulations.
I used to access a canadian site for low-carb products and one of them has
been transformed with organic products only, which are not lc and the
other one does not sell low-carb product anymore. I loved Dreamfield Pasta
occasionally, mostly for the practicallity of it. I cannot buy that product
anymore, at least in Canada, and if I import it from the USA, will it be
stopped by customs? I used to buy low-carb bread and eat that occasionnaly
also, but I cannot buy it anymore. There was a company called Carb-Option
which were offering a range of lc products (ex.: lemon tea, only 1 gm of
carbo for 8 ounces, which was great) not available anymore. The company
Carb-Option withdrew all its products off the selves in the months of
september/october of last year. So what can I do? Unfortunately, importing
from the US is expensive most of the time, and I have to consider the
exchange rate and usualy the s & h is also expensive.
Wow, it's been a while since I posted this. I think Canada has a much more
regulatory mindset then the U.S., at least in some areas. And this,
coupled with the "official" (as opposed to popular and growing scientific)
disdain for low-carb, means that they are more likely to legislate dietary
choices, even when those choices are of debatable nature.