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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Nutr.
Sec. Food Policy and Economics
Volume 11 - 2024 | doi: 10.3389/fnut.2024.1476771
This article is part of the Research Topic Food-Based Dietary Guidelines View all 3 articles

A Global Analysis of Portion Size Recommendations in Food-Based Dietary Guidelines

Provisionally accepted
Fanny Salesse Fanny Salesse 1,2Alison Eldridge Alison Eldridge 3Tsz Ning Mak Tsz Ning Mak 4Eileen R. Gibney Eileen R. Gibney 1,2*
  • 1 UCD Institute of Food and Health, University College Dublin, Dublin, Ireland
  • 2 Insight Centre for Data Analytics, University College Dublin, Dublin, Ireland
  • 3 Nestlé Research, Nestlé Institute of Health Sciences, Lausanne, Geneva, Switzerland
  • 4 Nestlé Research, Nestlé Institute of Health Sciences Singapore Hub, Singapore, Singapore

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    Objective: Since large food portion sizes (PS) lead to overconsumption, our objective was to review PS recommendations for commonly consumed food groups reported in Food-Based Dietary Guidelines (FBDGs) globally and to assess variation in PS across countries and regions. Methods: Consumer-oriented FBDGs from the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) online repository were used to evaluate dietary recommendations, PS and number of portions for common food groups. Guidelines were classified for each group as qualitative, quantitative, or missing. A standardized approach was applied to convert PS recommendations given as household measures, cup equivalents, pieces and other measures into grams for cross comparison. Variation of recommended PS of common food groups within and across regions was examined. Results: Among 96 FBDGs, variations were found both across and within regions. At a regional level, the highest regional median PS recommendations were seen in Europe for Meat, Fish and Pulses, in the Near East for Dairy Products, and in Africa for most grain-based foods. Recommendations for Fruits and Vegetables showed the highest consistency across FBDGs worldwide, whereas guidance on Meat, fish & eggs and Cooked cereals/grains showed discrepancies in the classification of foods into categories, as well as in the number of portions per day. Discussion: While some variation in PS recommendations across countries can be expected due to cultural and regional dietary practices, inconsistent definitions to refer to a portion and varied derivation methods may further produce discrepancies. Harmonizing development methods for FBDG could help establish more consistent reference portion sizes and therefore provide clearer guidance to consumers.

    Keywords: Food-based dietary guidelines, portion size, dietary recommendations, dietary habits, Food groups, healthy diet (Min.5-Max. 8)

    Received: 06 Aug 2024; Accepted: 18 Oct 2024.

    Copyright: © 2024 Salesse, Eldridge, Mak and Gibney. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence: Eileen R. Gibney, UCD Institute of Food and Health, University College Dublin, Dublin, Ireland

    Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.