For those hoping to live a healthier lifestyle, often times the first step is gaining a better understanding of the food you purchase and consume. One of the most effective ways to do this is through the Nutrition Facts Label on each packaged food product you’ll find in any store. Regardless of what your strategy is in losing weight, this label is where you’ll find the values of all the critical components of your food. Within the past year, some of the first changes to the label were made in twenty years as a result of new scientific findings and feedback.
Below you’ll find a detailed look at a number of the changes that were made and what that means for your family.
Table of Contents
Adjustments to Serving Sizes
As many dieters have come to understand, often times one of the most important elements of a truly balanced diet is controlling just how much of certain food products you’re consuming on a daily basis. The Nutrition Facts Label refers to this value as the serving size, and prior to the changes made this past year, it wouldn’t be surprising if you had previously overlooked it. The recent changes have made the font in which the value is displayed much larger and bold faced. In addition to this, new research has resulted in a number of products’ suggested serving sizes being changed to reflect a healthier daily diet.
Check Out the Calories
For health-conscious consumers, this value was almost impossible to miss. However, the FDA wanted to make sure no one had the chance to misread the value at any cost, which is why calories now has the largest sized font on the label. This information is necessary for those hoping to be successful in both losing and gaining weight. While the general recommendation is 2,000 calories daily, the amount of calories you should be intaking greatly depends on elements such as weight, height, age, physical output and many others.
Daily Percentage Values
Similarly to the serving sizes section, the daily percentage values have been updated as a result of new research findings. These values indicate how much an individual serving of any particular food product contributes to the daily requirements of the important nutrients your body needs. For individuals struggling with consuming too much or too little of a particular nutrient, this is extremely important.
Newly Included Nutrient Listings
This is likely the most noticeable of the changes this past year. As researchers have come to gather a better understanding of the dietary habits and nutritional awareness of Americans, information that was previously included in the nutrients label has been removed. This includes the blanket removal of Vitamins A and C as diet trends of Americans in recent years have indicated that these nutrient requirements are more commonly being met. Additionally, the calories from fat section has been removed. This change was made in order to reflect new research that indicates the type of fat (saturated or unsaturated) consumed is more important than the amount of that fat.
With any removal, comes some sort of addition. This section now includes information regarding the added sugars in any given food product, which are the sugars added throughout the processing or packaging stages of production. More vitamin considerations allowed for both Vitamin D and Potassium to be included on the label as well as these are less common nutrients in the American diet in recent years.
With all of this information, the FDA was hoping to help make more health-conscious choices a bit easier. These revisions should help you and your family make healthier choices when it comes to food. Be sure to check out the new label on your next trip to the supermarket.
Author bio: John Hinchey is VP of Sales for Westfalia Technologies, Inc., a leading provider of logistics solutions for plants, warehouses and distribution centers. He has more than 20 years of experience in manufacturing and warehouse automation.