(July 2013)
The FSANZ Food Composition Program developed and maintains a national food composition reference database known as NUTTAB. To maintain the currency of NUTTAB, it is important to update existing nutrient data as well as generate nationally representative nutrient data for priority foods for which we currently have limited data.
Nutrient data are used for a variety of reasons such as:
- supporting FSANZ risk assessments
- providing data for manufacturers' nutrition labelling of products
- informing university research on diet and disease
- developing educational material
- assisting consumers make good food choices.
Nutrient data are also incorporated into survey databases to help estimate the nutrient intakes of Australians, such as in the current 2011-13 Australian Health Survey (AHS). The data are also used in releases of the FSANZ online Nutrition Panel Calculator (NPC).
As part of FSANZ's program to develop and maintain up-to-date food composition data representative of foods eaten in Australia, we surveyed various foods for a range of nutrients and other chemicals. During 2012 we undertook a food analysis program to support our food composition work for the AHS.
In this paper we present the main findings of this analytical program and provide information on the samples selected for analysis. The methodology for identifying the foods and nutrients for analysis is presented as well as information on the number of samples of each food, sampling process, transport, photography, preparation of samples and storage.
Download the Strengthening our evidence base - Food analytical program for the development of a nutrient database for estimating food consumption and nutrient intakes (pdf 512kb) | (word 144kb)