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Table 3 Mean and median changes in Health Star Ratings (HSRs) of matched products – and changes in mean HSRs of unmatched products – between 2013 and 20171

From: The relationship between voluntary product (re) formulation commitments and changes in the nutritional quality of products offered by the top packaged food and beverage companies in Canada from 2013 to 2017

Company

Matched products1

Unmatched products

Mean ∆HSR2

Median ∆HSR2

p-value3

Mean (SD) HSR

Change in mean HSR4

p-value5

Abs.

%

Abs.

%

Products discontinued/sold to other companies (2013)

New/acquired products (2017)

Abs.

%

A. Lassonde

−0.2

−3.2

0.0

0.0

0.27

2.0 (0.8)

2.4 (0.9)

0.4

20.0

0.005

Agropur

−0.2

8.9

0.0

0.0

0.35

3.2 (1.5)

3.5 (1.2)

0.3

8.7

0.44

Campbell Soup

0.0

−0.4

0.0

0.0

0.21

3.0 (0.9)

3.3 (1.0)

0.3

8.7

0.14

Canada Bread

0.0

−0.2

0.0

0.0

0.51

3.5 (0.7)

3.3 (1.3)

−0.2

−6.8

0.55

Canada Dry Mott’s

0.0

1.7

0.0

0.0

0.41

2.6 (1.3)

1.9 (1.3)

−0.7

−25.5

0.18

Coca-Cola

0.1

6.0

0.0

0.0

0.31

2.2 (1.2)

1.9 (1.0)

−0.3

−14.2

0.24

Danone

0.0

0.3

0.0

0.0

1.00

4.3 (0.9)

3.4 (1.1)

−0.8

−18.9

0.001

General Mills

0.0

2.0

0.0

0.0

0.10

3.3 (1.3)

2.8 (1.2)

−0.5

−16.2

< 0.001

George Weston

0.0

−0.5

0.0

0.0

0.89

3.5 (0.8)

3.2 (0.9)

−0.3

−8.1

0.06

Kellogg

0.0

1.5

0.0

0.0

0.24

3.0 (1.1)

2.7 (1.0)

−0.3

−10.1

0.13

Kraft Heinz6

0.7

44.4

0.0

0.0

< 0.001

2.3 (1.1)

2.7 (1.1)

0.5

20.1

< 0.001

Loblaw

0.1

8.8

0.0

0.0

< 0.001

2.7 (1.2)

3.1 (1.2)

0.4

13.3

< 0.001

Maple Leaf Foods

0.1

8.6

0.0

0.0

0.03

2.6 (1.1)

2.6 (1.2)

0.0

−0.8

0.99

Mondelēz

0.2

20.2

0.0

0.0

< 0.001

0.9 (0.6)

2.0 (1.2)

1.1

116.6

< 0.001

Nestlé

0.1

6.9

0.0

0.0

0.003

2.6 (1.0)

2.4 (1.0)

−0.1

−5.2

0.21

Ocean Spray

0.6

34.1

0.0

0.0

0.04

2.6 (1.2)

2.4 (1.0)

−0.1

−5.8

0.97

Parmalat

0.0

22.4

0.0

0.0

0.96

3.8 (1.0)

3.0 (1.5)

−0.9

−23.0

0.004

PepsiCo

0.0

0.9

0.0

0.0

0.72

2.7 (1.1)

2.4 (1.1)

−0.3

−9.9

0.047

Saputo

−0.3

−14.3

0.0

0.0

0.04

2.0 (1.6)

3.2 (1.6)

1.1

55.7

0.004

Sobeys

0.1

7.0

0.0

0.0

< 0.001

2.8 (1.1)

2.9 (1.3)

0.1

3.6

0.051

Sun-Rype

0.0

0.0

0.0

0.0

N/A

2.6 (1.1)

2.2 (0.4)

−0.4

−16.9

0.52

Unilever

0.1

8.2

0.0

0.0

0.001

2.6 (0.8)

2.5 (0.7)

−0.1

−5.6

0.09

  1. 1Individual products offered by the sampled companies in both 2013 and 2017 were matched either by barcode or manually by identifying products with identical brand and product names, and the same or similar Nutrition Facts tables, ingredients lists and product packaging. Unmatched products refer to those collected in either 2013 or 2017, but not both years (e.g., newly developed or acquired products, or products that were discontinued or sold to companies not included in this sample). 2Absolute and percentage changes were calculated based on the 2013 and 2017 HSRs of each matched product (by dividing the difference in 2013 and 2017 HSRs by the 2013 HSR, multiplied by 100), and then averaged across all products to generate mean and median absolute and percentage changes. 3Results of Wilcoxon signed-rank tests; p-values < 0.05 were considered statistically significant (shown in boldface). 4Absolute and percentage changes were determined based on the mean HSRs for all unmatched products in 2013 and 2017; percentage change was calculated by dividing the difference between mean HSRs in 2013 and 2017 by the mean HSR in 2013, multiplied by 100. 5Results of Mann-Whitney U tests; p-values < 0.05 were considered statistically significant (shown in boldface). 6In 2013, Kraft Foods and Heinz were two separate companies prior to merging in 2015 and forming The Kraft Heinz Company. However, to enable examination of changes in the nutritional quality of the company’s products over time – and because Kraft Heinz was assessed as one company using the FCR scoring tool – Kraft and Heinz were treated as a single company in 2013, as was done in similar research conducted on the Australian market [24]
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BMC Public Health

ISSN: 1471-2458

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