"More than two years after the first report exposed high sugar levels in Nestle's baby products sold in Africa - while the same brands are sold completely sugar-free in Europe, Switzerland, and Germany - a new investigation by Swiss NGO Public Eye reveals that nothing has changed on the ground. "We wanted to see whether anything had changed in Africa, because Africa is a big market for Nestle, especially for Cerelac. Cerelac is the most popular baby cereal brand in Africa," Laurent Gaberell, a Public Eye investigator, said from Geneva. "To our surprise, nearly nothing had changed in two years. In fact, more than 90 percent of the products that we could analyse contained added sugar," he added, noting that the study examined around 100 Cerelac products sold across 20 countries. "The last time, we found four grams per serving of Cerelac in Africa. This time, we found nearly six grams in a single serving of Cerelac, 50 percent higher than the global average and twice the amount that Nestle used to add in India, which is a main market," Gaberell continued. The investigator pointed out that consuming such amounts of sugar at an early age poses a serious risk to children’s health, contributing to higher rates of obesity and related diseases, and affecting the development of children's taste preferences from the very first months of life. "These are really dangerous levels of sugar that Nestle is including in these products, and they are aware of it," he added. Commenting on this stark discrepancy, Gaberell underlined that "People [in Africa] feel it reflects a colonial attitude from Nestle. They don't understand why babies in Switzerland have access to safer, non-sugary products, while babies in Africa are given products full of sugar. No one understands this double standard from Nestle." Despite Nestle's claims that it offers sugar-free options globally, researchers allegedly found only one country - South Africa - where sugar-free alternatives are available, while the other 20 countries included in the study have no healthy options. "Nestle also says that our analysis is misleading because maybe we have taken into account not only added sugar, but also natural sugars from fruits or milk. That's not true," he clarified. "We measured only the sugar added by Nestle in the form of sucrose, which is table sugar." From Abidjan, Dimitri Claverie Doukoua, president of the Ivorian Consumers Association (AIC-Réveil), criticised Nestle's exploitation of legal loopholes and outdated local standards (Codex Alimentarius), noting alarming rates of obesity among children in his country - up to 35 percent. "I truly believe this is an injustice [...] If we know that sugar is dangerous to children’s health and it is removed in Europe, then it should be removed everywhere in the world, on all continents, without exception," Doukoua stressed. "I want to point the finger at our African leaders. At the level of the Codex Alimentarius, I can say that Nestle is currently within the standard," she continued. "So it is the standard that needs to be reviewed. This standard must be discussed and revised to become a zero–added-sugar standard." "I continue to call on our African leaders. It is their responsibility to carry the voice of the voiceless, the voice of consumers, and the voice of the population. When it comes to public health, they must act," Doukoua urged. Currently, more than 17 African countries are preparing a joint advocacy campaign to pressure governments to revise regulations and force Nestle to remove sugary products from African markets, adopting the same strict health standards it applies at its headquarters in Vevey, Switzerland. The roots of this issue go back to April 2024, when Public Eye, in cooperation with the International Baby Food Action Network (IBFAN), published an investigative report exposing Nestle’s double standards in Cerelac and Nido products. WHO guidelines clearly state that no added sugars or sweeteners should be included in foods for children under three years old. Public Eye described this behaviour as 'irresponsible', noting that these countries already face a double burden: malnutrition on one hand, and rapidly increasing rates of obesity and diabetes on the other."