How to read Labels - a short summary.


Label Reading

When buying a product, the first thing you will need to check is ingredients.

If a product has red list ingredients, don't bother even checking the carbs, but if it's fine ingredient wise, remember the following:

Labelling laws in SA dictate that products show the value of total carbs with dietary fibre already removed.

Yes. Let that sink in a bit. If you have been readon "carbohydrate" on a product and been removing The dietary fibre again - I hate to be the one to break it to you...but that would be removing dietary fibre twice.






Now, This can be shown by saying "carbohydrate", "carbohydrates" or "glycemic carbohydrates". (see table below). The only time you need to remove the dietary fibre yourself is when the product says TOTAL carbohydrates.

I have seen that often  this point was missed by seasoned banters, which can have a terrible knock on effect for others that read it, and their journey. Imagine purchasing a product marked:

Carbohydrate/s 30g
Of which sugar 5g
___________________
Dietary fibre 25g

Total carbohydrates of product is 55g, but now because it's been removed already, you're going to remove it again, thinking the product is green list, but it's actually red. See how that's potentially a problem? 

If you need help you can always ask on the group!






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