Guideline Daily Amounts Research Articles

Improving food purchasing choices through increased understanding of food labels, using itemized till receipts to measure these changes

Background: Rising obesity and the associated risks of diabetes and heart disease require changes in diet to bring about healthier eating. To achieve this, people need to understand nutrition and daily requirements but are frequently confused by nutrition information on food labels. The introduction of the Food Standards Agency's ‘Traffic Light’ and the alternative ‘Guideline Daily Amount’ systems may help or further confuse the public. A previous study showed that although 63% of study participants read labels, only 25% claimed to understand them, also knowledge of nutrient requirements and functions was low (Rigby, 2004). Ransley et al., (2001) have shown that till receipts can be used to estimate fat and energy intake. The aim of the current study was to investigate whether an intervention designed to improve understanding of nutrition and labels could improve food purchases and whether these changes could be measured from till receipts.Method: Participants were recruited from the general public (80 female; 23 males) (age <30 years (23), 31–45 years (25), 46–60 years (30), >60 years (22). Subjects were randomly assigned to either the intervention group (n = 78) who were provided with an information booklet and credit card sized nutrition and labelling information to use when shopping, or the control group (n = 25), who received the information after four weeks of normal shopping. The intervention group provided an initial till receipt pre intervention and was then given the nutrition and labelling material. Further till receipts were returned from successive shopping trips over the following 4 weeks. The nine categories of food used for comparison were: fruit and vegetables, saturated fats, monounsaturated fats, polyunsaturated fats, white cereals, wholegrain cereals, processed foods, full fat and reduced fat items. Ethics approval was obtained from NWW Wales NHS Trust ethics committee.Results: Each of the nine food categories on till receipts were calculated as a percentage of the total shopping, excluding non‐food items. General linear model repeated measures analyses showed differences between study participants’ food purchases. For the intervention group, purchases in three of the nine food categories showed significant improvements: increased purchases of fruits and vegetables (P < 0.001); reduction in purchases of saturated fats (P < 0.001); and reduction of white cereal purchases (P < 0.050). The control group showed no differences in any category.Discussion: Although the intervention group did show improvements in most of the other food categories, they were not statistically significant. Positive changes were found in seven of the nine categories, with only one, wholegrain cereals, showing a decrease in purchases rather than an increase. The control group displayed a random pattern over the four till receipts, with eight categories either showing negative change or no change; only one showed a positive change. The disproportionate group sizes may mean that it is not be possible to draw firm conclusions regarding the effectiveness of the intervention.Conclusions: This study demonstrates that positive changes in improving food‐purchasing choices, as measured by till receipts, can be made by using educational interventions. Further larger studies using routinely collected supermarket data would enable the study to be replicated on a much larger scale.References Ransley, J.K., Donnelly, J.K., Khara, T.N., Botham, H., Arnott, H., Greenwood, D.C. & Cade, J.E. (1991) The use of supermarket till receipts to determine the fat and energy intake in a UK population. Public Health Nutr. 4, 1279–1286.Rigby, P. (2004) Effecting change. Understanding nutritional information. Can increased knowledge and understanding in relation to nutritional information bring about a change in eating habits? PhD Thesis WA: Bangor University.

Risking regulatory capture at the UK's Food Standards Agency?

The delivery of safe food and health governance is challenging and contested,1 and knowledge and institutions independent of vested interests are essential for public health. [2], [3] and [4] In the 1990s, new institutional architectures for food and health regulation were created to serve two purposes. First, governments sought to rebuild public confidence in both food safety and policy making in the wake of crises, including salmonella, bovine spongiform encephalopathy, pesticides, dioxins, hormones, and antibiotic residues. Second, in response to commercial pressure to liberalise international trade, which portrayed differences in national food regulations as protectionist barriers, ostensibly scientific bodies were created to provide a uniform international regime. A decade on, how is the UK's Food Standards Agency (FSA) doing? The FSA, set up in 2000, despite undoubted progress in some domains, struggles in others. One such tussle is about front-of-pack nutritional labelling. The FSA along with British consumers and their representatives favour a traffic-light system, but food-industry heavyweights prefer a quantitative percentage system with guideline daily amounts. After intense lobbying from the industry, European Commissioner Markos Kyprianou proposed to adopt percentage guidelines, a decision viewed by some as potentially compromising public health.5 The FSA and the European Food Safety Authority have, however, also been criticised for failing to respond robustly about additives and hyperactivity, toxic effects of aspartame, trans fats, and acrylamide.

Nutritional Value of Edible Seaweeds

This article presents information on the nutritional aspects of seaweeds in terms of fiber, mineral content, fats and lipids, vitamin contents, and components that have a confirmed and investigated nutritional effect. The nutrient levels of seaweeds are also shown in comparison to currently applicable reference nutrient intakes or guideline daily amounts of nutrients and are contrasted with terrestrial foodstuffs with respect to selected nutrients. For the purpose of comparison, a sample serving size of 8 g dry weight of seaweed is used to illustrate the potential contribution of seaweeds to the diet.

Nutritional Value of Edible Seaweeds

This article presents information on the nutritional aspects of seaweeds in terms of fiber, mineral content, fats and lipids, vitamin contents, and components that have a confirmed and investigated nutritional effect. The nutrient levels of seaweeds are also shown in comparison to currently applicable reference nutrient intakes or guideline daily amounts of nutrients and are contrasted with terrestrial foodstuffs with respect to selected nutrients. For the purpose of comparison, a sample serving size of 8 g dry weight of seaweed is used to illustrate the potential contribution of seaweeds to the diet.

Nutritional profiling vs guideline daily amounts as a means of helping consumers make appropriate food choices

PurposeTo distinguish between the use of Guideline Daily Amounts (GDAs) for labelling purposes and traffic‐light labelling and to demonstrate the advantages of GDAs over traffic lights.Design/methodology/approachThe advantages of GDAs are laid out along with the disadvantages of traffic‐light labelling.FindingsThe background to the development of GDAs and the FSA traffic light scheme, currently being consumer tested, is explained. The Food and Drink Federation recommend that GDAs will be of more value to consumers as opposed to traffic lights, as the GDA system will help individuals to build up a balanced diet which is appropriate for them. However, education on how to use GDAs will be vital, and this is already under way.Practical implicationsA traffic‐light system is a very simplistic subjective approach to signpost labelling and makes it hard to convey the true nutritional value of a food. For this reason it may mislead consumers. GDAs are more objective and will help inform and educate consumers on how to eat a balanced diet.Originality/valueThe paper seeks to lay out the concept of GDAs and why it is a labelling concept that will help consumers with their diet. It should be of interest to those working in the food industry, health professionals, food and health academics and anyone who communicates messages about food and health or indeed consumes packaged food.

The origin of Guideline Daily Amounts and the Food Standards Agency's guidance on what counts as 'a lot' and 'a little'.

This paper provides the rationale for the Guideline Daily Amounts (GDAs) for fat, saturated fat and other nutrients that appear on food labels in the UK. These GDAs are provided voluntarily by manufacturers and retailers and were developed to help people make better use of nutrition labelling--the format of which is prescribed by the European Union's nutrition labelling directive. The paper also describes the basis to some Rules of Thumb for what counts as 'a lot' or 'a little' of fat, saturated fat and other nutrients, in an individual food. The paper gives the background to, and purpose of, the GDAs and Rules of Thumb and explains how they were calculated. It briefly describes their subsequent usage by food producers and others. Both GDAs and the Rules of Thumb first appeared in a leaflet developed by the authors and published in 1996 by the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food. GDAs for fat, saturated fat and energy were adopted subsequently by the Institute of Grocery Distribution and then by many retailers and some manufacturers. The Rules of Thumb for fat, saturated fat, sugar and sodium have recently been republished in some leaflets published by the Food Standards Agency in the UK. GDAs and Rules of Thumb may provide useful ways of helping consumers make sense of nutrition labelling. The current GDAs and the Rules of Thumb could usefully be updated in the light of recent developments.

Bursting with energy

Bursting with energy

UK industry guidelines on nutrition labelling to benefit the consumer

A three‐year consumer research programme, using both qualitative and quantitative techniques, was undertaken to assess whether additional voluntary nutrition information for calories and fat would aid consumers’ ability to use the nutrition information that is given on food packs. A variety of label formats was investigated. The research established that providing information for calories and fat per serving, either separately from the nutrition panel or highlighted within the nutrition panel, and providing Guideline Daily Amounts (GDAs) for calories and fat helped to make the nutrition information more accessible to consumers. GDAs were felt by consumers to be new and useful information. The research findings were developed into voluntary industry guidelines by an IGD working group consisting of representatives of manufacturers, retailers, consumer organizations, nutrition scientists and government. The guidelines represent best practice for industry.