The acronym GDA stands for guideline daily amounts and is the amount of sugar, fat, calories, salt and saturates that are in the food that you eat. According to whatsinsideguide.com, they help you to determine what and how much you should be eating using a guideline that is based on your individual needs. You can determine your GDA and eat healthier by following some simple steps.

Determine the correct amount of GDA for your age and gender. The average woman should be taking in 2000 calories and 90 g of sugar. Fat grams should equal 70 g, with only 20 g coming from saturated fat. Salt intake for an average woman is 6 g. Men should consume an average of 2500 calories, 85 g of sugar, and 6 g of salt. Their fat intake should be 95 g with only 30 g coming from saturated fats. Children from the ages of 5 to 10 should consume 1800 calories, 85 g of sugar and 4 g of salt. Their fat intake should be 70 g with only 20 g coming from saturated fat.

  • The acronym GDA stands for guideline daily amounts and is the amount of sugar, fat, calories, salt and saturates that are in the food that you eat.
  • Their fat intake should be 70 g with only 20 g coming from saturated fat.

Calculate your meals according to percentages to figure out daily intake. For instance, if you are a woman, and you generally take in too much sugar, you might want to pay particular attention to that area. So if you had a choice between orange juice or tea for breakfast, you would figure out that tea has 0.5 g of sugar and orange juice has 13.5 g by reading the nutrition labels. If you chose the orange juice, that would make up 14 per cent of your daily GDA for sugar, whereas the tea would be almost 0 per cent. Toast with a pat of butter contains about 2 g of sugar, or 2 per cent of your GDA, whereas a bowl of frosted cereal has approximately 17 g of sugar or 19 per cent of your GDA based on the recommended amount of 90 g total.
To calculate, you find how much of a specific GDA ingredient is in each food that you are eating by reading the nutrition label. Then divide that number by the total recommended number of grams to get percentages. For instance, if there are 2 g of sugar in a piece of toast, divide 90 (using the GDA for women in this example) into 2 (2/90) to get approximately .02. Multiply this number by 100 to get the percentage (2.2 per cent) and round it to the nearest whole number.

  • Calculate your meals according to percentages to figure out daily intake.
  • Toast with a pat of butter contains about 2 g of sugar, or 2 per cent of your GDA, whereas a bowl of frosted cereal has approximately 17 g of sugar or 19 per cent of your GDA based on the recommended amount of 90 g total.
    To calculate, you find how much of a specific GDA ingredient is in each food that you are eating by reading the nutrition label.

Keep a journal for several days, writing down everything you eat. Using the nutrition labels, enter the amount of calories, sugar, fat, salt and saturates next to each food. It's easy to create a chart with columns for each entry.

At the end of each day, total the numbers in each column to find out how much of each substance you are consuming for the day. This will show you whether you are getting the recommended amounts of each food type in your diet or going over or under the recommended amounts.

  • Keep a journal for several days, writing down everything you eat.
  • This will show you whether you are getting the recommended amounts of each food type in your diet or going over or under the recommended amounts.

Base your future food choices on your findings. Use the GDA to determine the amounts of sugar, fat, calories, salt and saturates you should get in your diet. See how close you can come each day to 100 per cent without going over. The recommendations are meant as a guideline to help you to make sound nutritional choices that will help you to maintain overall health. Go to satfatnav.com for shopping tips and GDA calculation tools.