Why do even nutrition experts struggle to agree on which foods count as ultra-processed?

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Even with full nutrition labels and ingredient lists, more than 150 French experts only reached about **0.32 agreement on a 0-to-1 scale** when using NOVA to decide which foods were ultra-processed. That is the heart of the problem: the system sounds crisp in public debate, but in practice it is blurry enough that trained people looking at the same product often land in different places.

The disagreement comes from several pressure points:

1. **There is no universally agreed definition of “ultra-processed.”**  
   NOVA is the dominant system, but its boundaries are broad and not objective enough. The word “ultra” implies there is some agreed normal amount of processing — but there is no consensus on where that line sits.

2. **Foods can contain signals from multiple NOVA levels at once.**  
   Plain yogurt shows the mess clearly: it is explicitly listed as a minimally processed food, yet fermentation can be treated as a processed-food feature, and components such as whey, casein, and lactose can push interpretation toward ultra-processed. So the same food can look “simple,” “processed,” or “industrial” depending on which rule the evaluator emphasizes.

3. **Ingredient lists do not solve the ambiguity.**  
   You might expect experts to agree once they see the full label. They don’t. The low agreement score did **not improve** when experts had access to nutrition labels and ingredient lists, because the disagreement is not just missing information — it is disagreement over how to interpret the information.

4. **NOVA often tracks industrial form, not nutritional value.**  
   Nutrient-dense foods can be labeled ultra-processed: fruit-flavored yogurt, ultrafiltered milk, packaged whole wheat bread, peanut butter, soymilk, tofu, light orange juice, canned greens, and flavored sunflower seeds. That makes experts hesitate, because the label can imply “junk food” even when the product may contribute fiber, protein, calcium, or micronutrients.

5. **Plant-based foods expose the weakness especially sharply.**  
   NOVA classifies many plant-based meat alternatives as ultra-processed, often because they contain concentrated protein. Around **90% of plant milks** may be classified as ultra-processed, largely because of additives. Soy milk and some tofu can also fall into that category, even though they may be nutritionally useful and sometimes minimally processed in ordinary food-science terms.

6. **Tiny formulation differences can flip categories in ways that feel arbitrary.**  
   Canned green beans with salt and grape jelly both fall into the same processed category because each combines a basic food with a culinary ingredient — salt in one case, sugar in the other. But their nutritional meaning is obviously not the same. That mismatch makes experts question whether the category is doing too much work.

7. **The category is too heterogeneous.**  
   “Ultra-processed” can include soda, chips, cookies, processed meats, baby formula, fortified foods, plant milks, meal replacements, whole-grain packaged breads, and fruit-based bars. A single label covering that range cannot reliably communicate health impact.

So experts struggle because the debate asks one label to do three jobs at once: describe industrial processing, predict health risk, and guide consumer behavior. It does the first imperfectly, the second inconsistently, and the third with real risk of confusion. A better approach is to judge foods by **both** processing level and nutritional profile — especially fiber, saturated fat, sodium, added sugar, cholesterol, micronutrients, and the role the food plays in the overall diet.

Ultra-Processed Foods: Classification, Nutrition, and Public Health Tradeoffs

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