Benefits Of Updated Nutrition Facts Label

Updated Nutrition Facts Label is a pamphlet that provides additional, more detailed information about the nutrients in the food products. It was released by FDA on May 27, 2016. The new label’s original purpose was to provide consumers with the information on factors like the number of calories in a food and its sugar content. However, the new label also includes a more detailed list of ingredients, upper tolerable limits for age groups for some nutrients (such as sodium), warnings about foods that may contain food allergens and company contact information.

Benefits of Updated Nutrition Facts Label

1. Provides more detailed information about the nutrients and calories.

This updated label will allow consumers to make more informed decisions about the food they eat. For example, if the consumer is trying to lose weight and would like to reduce their sodium intake, the updated label includes a breakdown of daily value percentages for sodium.

2. The label will be relevant to more foods.

In addition to being applied to most packaged foods in the grocery store, this label is also required on shelf stable foods like flavored waters and dried beans as well as non-prepackaged fresh produce at grocery stores where they can be found. The updated labels will also apply to Nutrition Facts tables on menus and menu boards at chain restaurants and similar retail food establishments by May 5, 2020.

3. Provides only the minimum amount of information.

The updated label will contain the same amount of information that existed on the previous label, but it will provide more detailed information on a per serving basis. This includes a breakdown of calories, fat, saturated fat, carbohydrate and protein, added sugars and sodium in the serving.

Potential Consequences of Updated Nutrition Facts Label

1. It may result in confusion for consumers.

As with any new label, there is potential for confusion if consumers have to interpret this new label rather than rely on nutritional labels found on non-prepackaged food (like restaurants) or packaged foods like cereal boxes.

2. There will be less white space on the label.

The new label’s size is 20 percent larger than the old one and much of that additional space is taken up by UPC codes and other verbiage that already existed on the current label but was just placed around the nutritional information.

3. It may result in lawsuits against manufacturers of poor quality food.

Potentially, a consumer could sue a seller for an illness, condition or death caused by eating a specific type of food if they believed that information on this updated label pointed to it being unhealthy for consumption or potentially dangerous to their health.