Since the days of the pyramid of food groups that identify what to eat to provide the body with the right nutrition, people focus on certain foods nutritional value to ensure they meet their daily needs. Today, food products are required to include a ‘nutrition facts’ label that discloses the amounts of calories, fat, carbohydrates, sugars, cholesterol, sodium, protein and fiber in a single serving. For foods that don’t have labels, such as fruits and vegetables, nutritional values can be obtained from many nutritional databases on the internet or nutritional books. It is necessary for people to understand how to read the nutrition facts label so they know if they are getting to little or too much of certain nutrients.

The value of the nutrition facts labels is to assist people in making informed decisions about the foods they eat based on their knowledge of how certain ingredients can affect their health. For someone with high-cholesterol, they want to purchase products with nutrition labels that show low amounts of cholesterol per serving. Besides determining food content value for health, the nutrition label may also include the percentage of daily values for important nutrients the body needs.

Most people read the nutrition facts label and aren’t sure how to use it to protect their health and maintain healthy daily values. The label should be read from top to bottom, starting with serving size. If the serving size is increased, the amounts of the good nutrients; vitamins and fiber will increase, but so will the other nutrients; cholesterol, sodium and fat, which should be kept at healthy levels. The amount of daily value chart that is included on larger packaged items is only a percentage of the total daily value of all nutrients. If a product has more than 20% of daily values it is considered high and should be consumed in moderation, as they can contribute to excessive levels of nutrients making them harmful to the body.