Do FDA guidelines prohibit foods with healthful ingredients from being labeled as healthy options?
Kind Snacks has raised concerns about the criteria set by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to qualify foods as healthy options.
According to a report from The Hill, Kind Snacks has filed a citizens petition, requesting that the FDA update the regulations for when the term healthy can be used as a claim on food labeling. These regulations have been the same for the past 25-years, and Kind Snacks and a number of nutritionists and health experts believe that it may be time for some updated guidelines.
The FDA recently ordered Kind Snacks to remove the healthy claims from the labels of its fruit and nut bars, which are made of ingredients that are commonly deemed to be healthy. The agency said those products do not meet the guidelines to be labeled healthy, because they contain more saturated fat and calories from saturated fat than is allowed for the bars to be considered low in saturated fat.
The FDA’s guidelines mandate that the word healthy may only be used to describe food products that contain three grams or less total fat and one gram or less of saturated fat per serving. However, fish and meat have different requirements. In order to be labeled healthy, fish and meat may have five grams or less total fat and two grams or less saturated fat per serving.
Kind Snacks claims that nutrient-rich foods like nuts, avocado, olives and salmon hence cannot be labeled as healthy under the FDA’s current regulations, even though federal dietary guidelines suggest that Americans should eat less meat and more fish and nuts.