Labeling: Added Sugars
In 1999, the Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI) petitioned the FDA to require that food labels declare how much added sugars foods contain. "Added sugars" refers to table sugar (sucrose), high fructose corn syrup (HFCS), honey, or other sweeteners added to a food. Reading the petition, one gets the sense it is about as gainful as the Morgan Freeman character’s parole hearings in The Shawshank Redemption; the FDA denied similar petitions from CSPI in 1986 and in 1993.
Currently, you can see total sugars on a food label, but there is no way for consumers to tell whether a food’s total sugars are naturally occurring or added. Take blueberry yogurt, for example. The label tells you the ingredients and the amount of total sugars, fat, and calories. You know yogurt has milk, blueberries, and a sweetener of some sort. Milk and blueberries each naturally contain sugar. If you are looking for the brand of yogurt with the least amount of added sugar, you have no way of knowing which one to pick! Labeling does not impose on the freedom of anyone to sell or eat junk, but it helps educate consumers and spread awareness about how they can make healthy choices.
Over the past several decades, Americans have replaced some of their sucrose habit with HFCS, but increased their total consumption of added sugars. Since its invention, per capita consumption of HFCS rose from nothing to 59.2 pounds per capita in 2004. At the same time, sucrose consumption fell from 101.8 pounds per capita in 1970 to 61.5 pounds per capita in 2004. Sucrose and HFCS consumption together in 2004 was 120.7 pounds per capita.
The impact the increase in added sugars we are enjoying has on our health is felt two ways – from what we are eating, and from what we are not eating. If you look at how we are eating all of these sugars, you will find that almost half the time we are drinking them: 33% of added sugars come from soft drinks, 10% of added sugars come from fruit drinks, and 3% of added sugars come from tea. Other sources are baked goods, dairy desserts, candy, and breakfast cereal. From that list, you can see that what we are eating (and drinking) is sugars, fat, sodium, preservatives, and artificial coloring and flavoring. What we are not eating is fiber, vitamins, minerals, and phytochemicals.
Citing osteoporosis, cancer, and heart disease as risks of such a diet, CSPI petitioned the FDA to establish a maximum Daily Reference Value of 40 grams (10 teaspoons) of added sugars, representing 10% of a 2000-calorie per day diet. CSPI did not pick the number 10% out of thin air; it is a worldwide standard – recognized by the WHO’s Global Strategy on Diet, Physical Activity, and Health, and implicitly recommended by the USDA’s Food Pyramid. CSPI’s petition requested that the FDA formalize the USDA’s implicit recommendation as a Daily Value and then require that food labels reveal how much added sugars the food contains too.
The FDA denied the CSPI petition in 1986 and in 1993, giving reasons like lack of public interest in reducing consumption of added sugars, lack of conclusive evidence that sugar is associated with chronic disease conditions, and inability to distinguish between added sugars and naturally occurring ones. In other words, Americans don’t care about what they eat, eating junk isn’t unhealthy, and even if it was – we couldn’t enforce required labeling because we can’t tell how much added sugar is in foods anyway! As for that last one, how does the FDA regulate foods that are allowed to claim “No added sugar!” now?
In 1999, CSPI shot back with a 71-page (count ‘em) petition answering every single one of the FDA’s excuses for why added sugars are not labeled on foods. You can read the petition here.
Recipe for America supports CSPI's call for required labeling of added sugars with a Daily Reference Value set at no more than 40g (10 teaspoons) per day, assuming a 2000-calorie diet. We see this as a first step to quantify how much added sugar qualifies a food as "high in sugar" so that future steps may be taken such as banning the advertisement of foods high in sugar during children's shows or forbidding foods high in sugar from making health claims on their labels.
More information
"Not So Sweet" - Hints on Avoiding Added Sugars (blog entry)CSPI's Petition to Require Added Sugar Labeling (news piece)
