Organize to buy healthy children's cereal with help from The Parent's Jury

Heard of The Parent Jury? They are a fantastic advocate for Australian Families. Their most recent Parent's Poll has announced the 'Worst Cereal offender'. I don't know about you but I have to closely watch what my kids eat or we suffer the consequences. I have to be really organized when I go shopping - with a list of nasty additives that they are allergic or intolerant to - a sadly long list. I use a great business card sized list that you can easily print out online by going to this link. http://www.smartsnacks.com.au/site/Page.aspx?PageId=22

Parent Jury joined nutritionist Dr Rosemary Stanton as part of an ongoing campaign to reveal the truth behind the marketing spin on popular children's food and drink products. They compared the on-pack claims on 14 children's cereals, nominated by members of The Parents Jury, with their actual ingredients and key information on the Nutrition Information Panels.

Kellogg's Nutri-Grain cereal was announced as the outright worst offender, with its traditional reputation as ‘Iron Man Food' that 'helps fuel growing boys' unable to stand up to its very low fibre content and high levels of sugar and sodium. Despite a re-formulation, Nestle Milo cereal was also criticised for its brazen packaging that features many ticks and statements about its wholegrain and fibre content, as well as the lines 'nutritious energy cereal' and 'now better 4 you'. With its 30 per cent sugar content Milo cereal cannot claim any "superior moral ground for good nutrition".

Along with the The Parents Jury, I strongly support the introduction of a mandatory 'front of pack' traffic light food labelling system that uses red, amber and green colour coding to rate levels of fat, saturated fat, sugar and sodium on packaged foods, enabling consumers to make informed choices at a glance. The more consumers let themselves be heard the quicker these important changes will be made. It's worth finding the time by being organized to do this. Go to http://www.parentsjury.org.au/ for more info. The 'Choice' Magazine website has a lot of useful information too. Go to http://www.choice.com.au/viewArticle.aspx?id=106322&catId=100228&tid=100008