BABIES should be fed exclusively breast milk and formula milk for the first six months, then weaned on to solids, an expert has said.

Gill Rapley, of the United Nations Children's Fund (Unicef), said spoon-feeding pureed food to children can cause health problems later in life. She said feeding babies pureed - paste-like - food is unnatural and unnecessary.

She said: "Sound research and government advice now agree there is no longer any window of a baby's development in which they need something more than milk and less than solids."

More than four out of five of one million babies aged between four and 20 months eat and drink baby food worth more than £120m a year. Makers of baby food say they are taking Rapley's study seriously.

Roger Clarke, of the Infant and Dietetic Foods Associations, representing such manufacturers as Heinz, Nestle, Boots and Nutricia, said: "Infant food companies support a flexible approach to feeding infants but the age at which solids are introduced depends on the nutritional and developmental needs of individual infants."

Rapley said: "In 2002, the World Health Organisation backed research that found breast or formula milk provided all the nutrition a baby needs up to the age of six months.

"That research said feeding a baby any other food during their first six months would dilute the nutritional value of the milk and might even be harmful to the baby's health."

Offering babies pureed food once they can chew is not only unnecessary, it could delay the development of chewing skills, Rapley believes.

Mark Richardson