Labeling, food nutrition

Site for the Food and Drug Administrations Centerfor Food Safety and Applied Nutrition. Here you will find links to the FDA s stance on such topics as dietary supplements, food labeling, and nutrition. 

JW DeVries, AL Nelson. Meeting analytical needs for nutrition labeling. Food Technol 48 73-79, 1994. 

MAFF (Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food) (1999) Guidance Notes on Nutrition Labelling. Food Standards Agency, UK. 

The Nutrition Labeling and Education Act of 1990 (NLEA). This is an extension of the FDCA and requires that all foods intended for retail sales are provided with nutrition labeling. Mandatory nutrition labeling is not required in most other countries unless a health claim is made. 

Food nutrition labels specify the sodium content of packaged foods. This information is especially helpful to people who need to watch or restrict how much sodium they consume. IMAGE COPYRIGHT 2009, BRITTANY COURVILLE. USED UNDER LICENSE FROM SHUTTERSTOCK.COM,... 

In the United States, additional ramifications maybe expected from FDA s announcement of final regulations for new food labeling requirements under the directive of the Nutrition Labeling and Education Act of 1990 (2). Among other things, these regulations limit health claims that can be made on food labels. They also require new information on nutrient content, and limit the use of descriptors such as low and free in association with calories, fat levels, and other food product characteristics. 

Information about a food s potassium content is required on the nutrition facts panel only if the food contains added potassium as a nutrient or if claims about it as a nutrient appear on the label. In all other cases, it is voluntary. The recommended daily value for potassium is 3500 mg. The following labels have been designated for foods high potassium (700 mg or more per serving) good source of potassium (350—665 mg per serving) more or added potassium (at least 350 mg more per serving than the reference food) (43). 

Other expansions of FDA s authority include the Dmg Price Competition and Patent Term Restoration Act of 1984, commonly known as the 1984 Amendments or the Waxman-Hatch Act, which was passed to attain quicker marketing of safe, effective, and less expensive generic dmgs and the Safe Medical Device Amendments of 1990, which was passed to correct perceived weaknesses in the implementation of the 1976 Device Amendments. Congress further expanded FDA authority over nutrition labeling and health and nutrient content claims on food labels with the Nutrition Labeling and Education Act of 1990. 

AOAC Method 985.29for TDF. This AO AC method (3), referred to as the method of Prosky and co-workers (4), was cited in the Nutritional Labeling and Education Act of 1990 as the general analytical approach for food labeling of dietary fiber content. The method has undergone several modifications for IDE and for the primary fractions, SDE and IDE. 

Generation of data on the nutrient content of agricultural products and foods forms the basis for estimating nutrient intakes of populations via dietary surveys, nutritional labelling for consumer protection, nutrition education for consumer food choice, home and institution menu planning and food purchase, and for research in nutrient requirements and metabolism, toxicant chemical composition is used to assess effects of farm management practices, crop culture, and food processing on chemical content and implications for human health. 

Much of the analytical data on the nutrient content of foods is generated using official methods of analysis (e.g. AO AC International). An evaluation of AO AC Methods of Analysis for Nutritional Labelling is available (Sullivan and Carpenter 1993). While these methods have often been studied for a variety of food matrices, applicability over the entire range of food matrices has not been formally studied in most cases. In addition, RMs are not available over the entire range of food matrices (Wolf... 

For regulatory purposes, food-based RMs play an important role in validating accuracy of analytical data from use of routine methodology. For example, the quality of data obtained by analytical measurements serves an important function with regard to ensuring nutritional label claims. Unfortunately, and historically in some cases, assay data for the same analyte can vary greatly from laboratory to laboratory. Evalua-... 

Learning how to read nutrition labels (Figure 8.1). This can help a person determine how many calories a particular food item has and also understand how much fat, carbohydrate, and protein is contained in a food. 

Around 80% of pre-packaged foods carry some nutritional information and failure to do so is likely to lose sales. There will be those customers who have medical advice about diet coupled to those who are trying to lose weight. Both classes of customers are likely to ignore products that do not have a nutritional label. Indeed, some may view the omission as an attempt to cover up an unfavourable situation. 

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