Sodium Reduction in the U.S. Food Supply 2010-2022: A Preliminary Assessment of Progress
The FDA encourages nutritious diets that support health and wellness. The U.S. faces an ever-growing epidemic of preventable diet-related chronic diseases such as cardiovascular disease, type 2 diabetes, and obesity. Improving nutrition offers one of the greatest opportunities for reducing these and other chronic illnesses and premature death. One way the FDA promotes nutritious eating patterns is by encouraging industry to make foods healthier including by reducing sodium content. Too much sodium can raise blood pressure, which is a major risk factor for heart disease and stroke.
More than 70 percent of sodium that people in the U.S. consume comes from processed and prepared foods, not from the saltshaker at home. It is difficult for consumers to reduce their sodium intake because the level of sodium across the food supply is too high. By reducing sodium levels in the food supply, consumers will have more choices that can fit into a healthy dietary pattern.
To help address the public health problem of excess sodium consumption, the FDA is taking a phased approach to setting voluntary sodium reduction targets in foods to help gradually reduce sodium across the food supply. This fact sheet summarizes a preliminary assessment on progress on the first set of targets.
- FDA Sodium Reduction Targets
- Preliminary Assessment
- Progress in Sodium Reduction for Packaged and Restaurant Food Categories (2010 to 2022)
- Conclusions
FDA Sodium Reduction Targets
In October 2021, the FDA published a final guidance with voluntary sodium reduction targets to provide measurable, 2.5-year targets. The agency is now referring to these as Phase I targets. The Phase I targets were designed to support reducing average sodium consumption from 3,400 milligrams/day (mg/day) to 3,000 mg/day and were based on data from 2010. Two and half years from October 2021 is April 2024.
In August 2024, the FDA published a draft guidance Voluntary Sodium Reduction Goals: Target Mean and Upper Bound Concentrations for Sodium in Commercially Processed, Packaged, and Prepared Foods (Edition 2) with new, 3-year voluntary sodium reduction targets in foods to advance progress already made in reducing sodium in the food supply. The new targets, referred to as Phase II, build on the Phase I targets issued in 2021.
FDA will consider comments on these targets before issuing final guidance. The new targets, if achieved, would support reducing sodium intake to about 2,750 mg/day. While this is higher than the recommended upper level of 2,300 mg/day for those 14 years and older, the FDA is taking an iterative approach toward reaching its sodium reduction goals. Further, even modest improvements across the population could produce a large public health benefit.
Preliminary Assessment
Below is a preliminary look at the progress being made toward reaching the Phase I targets outlined in the 2021 final guidance. The FDA assessed packaged food label, sales and restaurant menu data from 2022, the most recent year for which data are available, using the same methods outlined in the 2021 final guidance. We are not yet able to fully assess progress against the Phase I targets until relevant data from the 2.5 year period ending April 2024 are available. A formal evaluation will be made available once the FDA has reviewed the 2024 data. We anticipate even greater progress toward the Phase I targets will have been achieved once those data become available.
Results assessing progress in reducing sodium in foods comparing 2010 (baseline year used for the Phase I sodium measurements) and 2022 (the most recent date for which data were available) are encouraging and reflect a preliminary look at progress in reducing sodium across the food supply. Since some subcategories were added or removed between 2010 and 2022 (because of available data), only comparable subcategories were analyzed. For example, six packaged food categories in 2022 do not have a 2010 counterpart and 15 restaurant food categories in 2022 did not have a 2010 counterpart. Overall, 40% of food categories had already achieved the Phase I sodium targets or were within 10% of meeting the targets.
Progress in Sodium Reduction for Packaged and Restaurant Food Categories (2010 to 2022)
|
Packaged & Restaurant Food Categories Combined |
Packaged Food Categories |
Restaurant Food Categories |
|---|---|---|
|
More than 50% of the categories decreased in sodium 34% of the categories increased in sodium There was no change in 14% of categories |
More than 60% of the categories decreased in sodium (of these, 30% decreased more than 10%) 25% of the categories increased in sodium There was no change in 12% of categories |
35% of the categories decreased in sodium (of these, 40% decreased more than 10%) 49% of the categories increased in sodium There was no change in 16% of categories |
Note: ‘No change’ is defined as a difference in the 2010 and 2022 sales weighted means of less than plus or minus 2%.
More detailed progress towards the Phase I sodium reduction targets as of 2022 among food categories is shown below. There are 16 overarching food categories with individual sodium targets for 163 subcategories of food because a one-size approach does not fit all; in 11 of the 16 overarching food categories at least 50% of food categories decreased in sodium.
Progress in Sodium Reduction by Overarching Food Categories (2010 to 2022)
Of the overarching food categories represented below, some are comprised of packaged foods (e.g. Toddler/Baby Food), some combine packaged and restaurant foods (e.g. Sandwiches), and some may have included non-comparable food subcategories due to subcategories being removed or added from 2010 to 2022 (e.g. Mixed Ingredient Dishes excludes 4 subcategories as they were added in 2022). In addition, the number of subcategories within each overarching food category differ as sample sizes may not have been large enough to include the data in either 2010 or 2022.
The FDA will continue to monitor the sodium content of the food supply as more data become available to evaluate further progress.
Conclusions
This preliminary assessment shows progress in reducing sodium and achieving FDA’s Phase I targets between 2010 and 2022 in a majority of food categories. Overall, 40% of food categories had already achieved the Phase I sodium targets or were within 10% of meeting the targets. We anticipate even greater progress toward the Phase I targets when data from 2024 become available. The FDA will conduct a more formal evaluation at that time. The greatest number of reductions were seen in packaged food categories. While a number of restaurant categories have shown reductions, there may be a lag in progress as restaurants are able to obtain more ingredients with reduced sodium content. Of special note, already as of 2022, manufacturers of certain toddler and baby foods had lowered sodium content beyond the Phase I targets.