The new label design released Friday by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration includes serving sizes of foods and drinks, such as large, 20-ounce sodas, that more accurately reflect the amounts people consume.
Advertisement
The Nutrition Facts label has been around more than two decades with the goal of helping consumers eat more healthfully.
The administration, or FDA, hopes the new labels will help consumers understand how much sugar is added to packaged foods and enable them to make better choices.
Nutrition facts labels on food packages are getting a long-awaited makeover, with calories listed in bigger, bolder type and a new line for added sugars. Under the new rules, the labels will indicate how much sugar was added to sweeten the food – that’s in addition to the naturally occurring sugar, as in, say, a fruit – and what percent of daily intake that is. Vitamins A and C are switching from required to optional because Americans do tend to get enough of them.
“This is going to make a real difference in providing families across the country the information they need to make healthy choices”, the First Lady said in a statement. “Daily values are reference amounts of nutrients to consume or not to exceed and are used to calculate the %DV that manufacturers include on the label”, the FDA noted.
Larger food manufacturers will be mandated to start using the new labels by July 26, 2018.
Because that’s how most people eat chips – in servings of two at a time. Listings for “total fat”, “saturated fat”, and “trans fat” are still required.
The Sugar Association, which represents US sugar cane farmers, refiners, sugar beet farmers and processors, said it was “disappointed” at the requirement to list added sugars on the label and said the FDA had not demonstrated a scientific link between sugar and disease.
Nickless said the updated labels are more transparent than they were, but could go still further by including information about allergens and genetic modifications. She has promoted label updates as part of her “Let’s Move!” campaign against childhood obesity.
Health concerns now focus more on calorie consumption than on fat.
After 20 years, nutrition labels on packaged foods will have a new look.
Now, in most cases, the serving size will be the size of the whole package-a huge shift considering many companies have worked around that to market their goods as healthier than they really are.
The Affordable Care Act requires that, by the end of the year, all chain restaurants with more than 20 locations nationwide will need to list calorie information alongside their menu items.
Americans are about to find out exactly how much sugar they’ve actually been eating-like it or not. Similarly, the serving size for sodas will increase from 8 ounces to 12 ounces. These will no longer be required on labels since deficiencies of these vitamins are rare nowadays.
Advertisement
What products will get the new labels?
