What is the NPM Calculator?
Developed by Dr Victoria Jenneson, the NPM Calculator offers a quick and consistent way to assess whether a product may be subject to The Food (Promotion and Placement) (England) Regulations 2021 and The Advertising (Less Healthy Food Definitions and Exemptions) Regulations 2024 —commonly referred to as the HFSS legislation.
It supports a wide range of users, including:
- Retailers
- Manufacturers
- Policymakers
- Academics
- NGOs
Why We Created the NPM Calculator
“There’s been a boom in food environment policy in the UK, with the Nutrient Profiling Model at the heart of much of the new legislation,” explains Dr Vicki Jenneson.
This includes:
- Restrictions on product placement
- Limits on TV and online advertising
- Local authority outdoor advertising policies
- Bans on multi-buy offers
“Whilst it’s fantastic to see this policy progress, it’s resulted in lots of new people being introduced to the NPM and left a lot of heads scratching to try and understand and implement it consistently.
That’s why I developed The NPM Calculator, as a free to use, transparent and consistent aid for calculating NPM scores, which doesn’t require prior expertise in Nutrition or Regulations.”
Due to its popularity, the calculator now includes:
- A multiple product assessment feature
- An R package for scalable use across larger datasets
How our stakeholders are using the NPM Calculator
The calculator is being used by policymakers, academics, charities, retailers, nutritionists, and trading standards enforcement officers, across the UK, in their efforts to drive product reformulation and to implement, evaluate and enforce legislation for healthier food environments.
“Bite Back’s youth activists regularly share examples of where they feel targeted by HFSS products and marketing. The calculator is a really helpful tool that supports our research and policy work, enabling us to back up young people’s lived experience and desire for healthier options to be more accessible, advertised and affordable.”
Nika Pajda, Head of Policy & Research, Bite Back 2030
‘The University of Leeds nutrient profiling calculator is a great tool to support industry professionals in understanding the HFSS score of their products. It will assist in navigating regulations on promotions and advertising across the UK.’
Louise Allen, Food & Drink Federation
“At the Obesity Health Alliance, ensuring our policy development and media stories are robust and evidence-based is incredibly important to us and our members. Being able to use the Nutrient Profiling Model Calculator to verify our product data has been invaluable.
We love the NPM Calculator because it’s accurate, time-saving and easy to interpret, with the ability to assign classifications to different existing policies an added bonus. We’re hugely excited about the multiple capabilities of the updated tool.”
Katharine Jenner, Obesity Health Alliance, Executive Director
- The calculator was shared on a national forum for Trading Standards Officers as a tool to assist with the enforcement of legislation to restrict the placement of HFSS (high in saturated fat, sugar and salt) products in stores and online
- The NPM Calculator was used by researchers on the DIO Food project to evaluate the impact of legislation restricting location placement of products high in fat, salt and sugar. The NPM Calculator was used to assess HFSS status of products, linked to sales data from ASDA, Morrisons, Sainsbury’s and Tesco, who collectively represent 65%* of UK supermarket sales.
- Researchers at the University of Leeds used the NPM Calculator in the MAAP Research Project (Mapping Advertising Assets Project) which assessed the prevalence and healthiness of food and drink advertisements on outdoor assets across Leeds.
How to Use the NPM Calculator
Watch our videos below to learn how to use the NPM Calculator, or follow the user guide on the NPM Calculator website.
