Canada's New Food Guide Cuts Out Fruit Juice And Replaces It With Just Water

A brand-new food guide is soon to be released by Health Canada and as Narcity reported last week, milk and cheese have been cut out almost entirely. Now, Health Canada is announcing that fruit juice should also be completely cut out of the food guide as well. In the previous Food Guide, half a glass of fruit juice counted as one serving of fruit or vegetables, but now this isn’t going to be the case.

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The proposed change will recommend water as the main drink of choice when it comes to healthy eating. While some fruit juices do have natural fruit sources, it also contains more sugar than an average person should intake within the day and that's why Health Canada is recommending the change.

While juice brands like orange juice love boasting that they can fit 16 oranges into a carton, it also means that you are drinking more natural sugars and fruit servings than your body actually needs. Replacing fruit juice with water is said to significantly reduce this sugar intake.

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Health Canada spokesperson, Geoffroy Legault-Thivierge, stated this to CBC news, “Health Canada’s proposed recommendations are for plain water as the beverage of choice, to help reduce sugar intake,”.

 Another factor for Health Canada pushing to cut off fruit juice entirely is that fruit juice doesn’t contain the fruit fiber that fills you up, as a normal piece of fruit would. Therefore, it will not actually fill your appetite and will lead to you in taking more calories throughout the day.

However, Canadian juice companies have a different opinion from Health Canada and are fighting to remain within the food chart.

Canadian Juice Council spokesperson, Jeff Rutledge, stated, “Canadians are not overconsuming 100 per cent juice… 100 per cent juice can play a key role in helping to meet daily nutrient requirements,”.

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Although, this new food guide seems to be following habits of Canadians. Mintel reports that juice consumption among Canadians dropped 15 percent between 2011 to 2017 and many consumers are starting to become aware of the sugar content that is present within fruit juice.

Regardless, drinking that cup of orange juice in the morning with breakfast may soon not actually count towards your fruit and vegetable intake for the day, and you might want to think about swapping it out for an actual orange.

Source: CBC News