To keep added sugar in its place

True or false?

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) recently proposed that nutrition labels on packaged foods cite the amount of added sugars they contain as a percentage of the recommended daily calorie intake. The proposal brought immediate criticism from manufacturers of foods and beverages, which claimed that the labels would confuse customers and that dietary limits on added sugars were not scientifically justified.

Last year, for the first time, the FDA proposed that companies list added sugars on nutrition labels, but consumers would have had to do the math themselves to determine the percentage of calories. Under the new proposal, nutritional labels would lay out that figure.

Agency officials determined that 50 grams of added sugars should be the upper dietary limit, or daily value, for adults and children aged four and older. Marion Nestle, a professor of nutrition, food studies and public health at New York University predicted that the label change would not only “affect the choices of the subset of people who read labels” but also, more important, “encourage food manufacturers to look harder for ways to cut down on added sugar in their products.”

Officials at the Grocery Manufacturers Association, a trade group, criticised as inadequate the standards the agency used to establish a dietary value for added sugars. “Before FDA requires that a per cent dietary value be declared for any nutrient, it must assure that the dietary value is based on intake levels evaluated through an independent, rigorous scientific process,” the organisation said in a statement.

Catherine Saint Louis & Stephanie Strom
NYTNS