RETAILERS using ‘fake’ farm branding on food products may be misleading shoppers, farmers leaders have complained.
The English NFU has written to the National Trading Standards Institute to formally air its concerns that branding featuring farm names and images is persuading shoppers to buy products that have an origin very different from the products that they think they are buying.
The most recent and high profile example is Tesco’s introduction of fresh produce lines under brand names such as ‘Woodside Farms’ and ‘Boswell Farms’ – fictional establishments that do not represent the actual supply chain behind the goods. At least three in five respondents to a recent YouGov survey of 1796 adults said that these branded products, in their view, were ‘definitely’ or ‘probably’ British, and that they would feel misled if that was not the case.
NFU president Meurig Raymond said: “The NFU’s legal team has looked at this carefully and as a result we are asking the National Trading Standards Institute to look at whether ‘fake’ farm branding complies with the relevant legal requirements.
“I have spoken to senior management at Tesco to highlight our members' concerns about the use of these fake farm brands. I urge all retailers to consider seriously the results of our survey which show that mixing imported product with British product under the same fictional farm name can be misleading to many of their customers. I am pleased that Aldi has now made a commitment to only source British product in their fictional farm brands by the end of March 2017.
“British farming is proud of its high standards and the NFU would be delighted to work with retailers to ensure that customers are given clear and unambiguous information about where their food comes from,” said Mr Raymond.
NFU Cymru president Stephen James, speaking at the start of this year’s Royal Welsh Show, said: “These fake farm brands are completely unacceptable and we believe are misleading consumers. This practice has been going on across the retail sector for a long time and enough is enough.
“In particular, NFU members feel the brands confuse shoppers about the country of origin of the food products in question. Country of origin labelling is important because we know from consumer surveys that shoppers want to buy British food products; clearly, consumers cannot exercise that choice without clear country of origin labelling.
“That’s why we have now written to Trading Standards to argue our point and to ask for clear guidelines for retailers on the clarity of country of origin labelling.”
The NFU also have the full backing of the Soil Association, whose chief executive Helen Browning added: “The Soil Association strongly supports the NFU’s complaint over ‘fake’ farm branding. We agree that using fictional farm names to give shoppers a sense of provenance is deeply misleading. People increasingly want to know where our food comes from, and want honesty and authenticity, not deceptive veneers. Branding that uses fictitious farms threatens to undermine trust in sales from genuine British farms at a time of great uncertainty and vulnerability for all UK farmers.”