• by Karlene Lukovitz , August 13, 2010

Nonprofit health advocacy group The Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI) is now targeting the "all natural" claim made on the label of some Ben & Jerry's ice cream products.

CSPI sent a letter to Paul Polman, CEO of B&J parent company Unilever, urging the company to drop the brand's claim, or the organization will "take its concerns to the Food and Drug Administration and state attorneys generals."

CSPI says that at least 48 out of 53 B&J flavors of ice cream and frozen yogurt bearing the "all natural" claim contain alkalized coca, corn syrup, partially hydrogenated soybean oil and other ingredients that "either don't exist in nature, or have been chemically modified."

"These ingredients are safe—only a small amount of partially hydrogenated oil is used—but it's a stretch to call any of them 'natural,'" said CSPI executive director Michael F. Jacobson.