It fears that, should the symbols be wrongly interpreted, consumers might needlessly drop foods such as crisps and cheese.

Consequently, it considers the traffic light system to be too simplistic and instead favours the more complex Guideline Daily Amount system, which gives the content details of fat, saturates, calories, sugar and salt in actual quantities and as a percentage of the guideline daily amount.

The GDA system is also supported by food processors Unilever, Nestle, Pepsi, Danone, Kraft and Kellogg's.

"There is confusion over how the traffic light system should be interpreted," said Robin Tapper of the NFU's food chain policy unit. "For example, a red symbol means proceed with caution, not stop, as you might expect it to mean."

Source: FWi