Have you ever looked at a box of food or a food label and seen a ton of nutritional claims? Companies stating that their product is “a good source of” a nutrient or being “95% fat-free”, but do you really know what that means? Below I have listed some nutritional claims/terms and their definitions that are found on product packages and food labels.
General Terms
· Good source of: in order for a product to make this claim it must provide 10-19% of the Daily Value for a given nutrient per serving.
· Healthy: is a term used for a food that is low in fat, saturated fat, sodium, and cholesterol, and contains at least 10% of the Daily Values for vitamin A, vitamin C, iron, calcium, protein, or fiber.
· High: (synonyms- “rich-in”, “excellent source”) means a food provides 20% or more of the Daily Value for a given nutrient per serving.
· Less: (synonyms- “fewer”, reduced”) in order for a product to make this claim it has to have at least 25% of a given nutrient or calorie than the comparison food.
· Light or Lite: this claim means this food is 1/3 fewer calories than the comparison
· Organic: in order for a food to be able to make this claim it must mean at least 95% of the product’s ingredients have been grown and processed according to USDA regulations defining the use of fertilizers, herbicides, insecticides, fungicides, preservatives, and other chemical ingredients.
Energy Claims
· Calorie-free: this means that the product contains fewer than 5 calories per serving.
· Low-calorie: this means the product contains 40 calories or less per serving.
· Reduced calorie: this claim means that the product has at least 25% fewer calories per serving than the food in comparison.
Fat Claims
· Percent fat-free: a product can only use this if it meets the definition of low fat or fat-free and must reflect the amount of fat in 100 grams. For example, a food contains 2.5 grams of fat per 50 grams can claim to be “95% fat-free”.
· Fat-free: (synonyms- “zero-fat”, “no-fat”, “nonfat”) a product must be less than 0.5 grams of fat per serving.
· Low fat: this means that the product contains 3 grams or less of fat per serving.
These are only a few of the terms thrown on food packaging. Next time you see one of these terms you will actually know what they are claiming!
Kinsey,
I noticed a lot of the terms are ‘per serving’ (ie…40 Kcals or less per serving), is there any legislation regulating how large or small a serving can be?
Can food companies just make a serving so small that they call it ‘low-fat’, which may be true for each serving, but most people would eat many servings at a time, making it not so ‘low fat’?