All member states of the World Health Organization (WHO) have signed up to the target to reduce salt intake by 30% by 2025. Salt reduction has been shown to be one of the most cost-effective, and in some cases, cost-saving ways of reducing the growing burden of non-communicable diseases, primarily through reducing the incidence of cardiovascular diseases. The physiological requirement for salt is less than 1 gram per day, however, most populations are eating between 9 and 12 grams. Excess salt intake progressively elevates blood pressure levels throughout life, which greatly increases the risk of vascular disease and is likely to be responsible for about half of the disease burden ascribed to high blood pressure. In the US, it is projected that an intervention reducing salt by 3 g/day would save between 10 and 24 billion dollars in health costs each year. Similarly high levels of health care savings have been predicted elsewhere, showing this is an issue for all countries.
There are now 83 countries who have salt reduction strategies either in place or planned.
We try to keep up to date with global sodium reduction initiatives, however if you are aware of any which aren’t shown on the map below, please let us know.
Key
- Mandatory Targets
- Voluntary Targets
- Industry Meetings
- Reformulation Planned
Source: Target Salt 2025: A Global Overview of National Programs to Encourage the Food Industry to Reduce Salt in Foods – by Webster, et al.