JRC: more than 180,000 packaged products from 21 countries in the FABLE tool — large differences in nutrient content, and breakfast cereals in most countries with less sugar than in earlier data but more fat
In a news release of 7 October 2026 the European Commission’s Joint Research Centre (JRC) presented the first large-scale overview of the nutritional quality of packaged foods in 21 European countries; the report was published on 6 October. Researchers analysed more than 180,000 products in five categories — breakfast cereals, bread products, fresh dairy products and desserts, delicatessen meats and similar products, and soft drinks — using label data collected in the FABLE tool.
- The Food and Beverages Label Explorer (FABLE) is a JRC online tool providing product-level data collected from food and drink labels — including nutrient composition and its trends, and ingredients — from EU-funded projects (according to the report: EUREMO and the Joint Actions Best-ReMaP and JANPA). According to the JRC, until now there was no systematic, freely accessible overview of the nutrient composition of packaged foods.
- Nutrient content varies widely between and within countries and between products of the same category: total sugars in breakfast cereals range from 1 to 28 g per 100 g, saturated fat in delicatessen meats and similar products from less than 1 to 14 g per 100 g. In breakfast cereals, total sugars fell markedly in most countries compared with earlier data collections, but total and saturated fat increased — improvement in one nutrient is sometimes offset by a worsening of another.
- Average contents were compared with WHO and EFSA daily intake recommendations and with consumption data: a ham sandwich with 2–3 slices of ham and a salad with 2 slices of bacon in one day already provide 40% of the maximum daily salt intake from the deli meat alone, and according to an estimate of free sugars in the dataset one can of cola (330 ml) and 40 g of high-fibre fruit cereals exceed the maximum daily intake of free sugars more than twofold.
- JRC conclusions: reformulation should target the sub-categories with the greatest potential impact, with a holistic approach to nutritional quality rather than single-nutrient strategies. The report (EUR 40848) points to EU policy levers: targeted reformulation incentives, updated nutrient benchmarks and enhanced FABLE-based monitoring.