When it comes to fruits, I get it.
Example:
Bananas — per 100g: carbohydrate 20.3g of which sugars 18.1g. Obviously naturally high in sugar and no added sugar here.
But what with products containing various ingredients?
Example:
Carrot and coriander soup — per 100g: carbohydrate 5.6g of which sugars 4.1g.
Ingredients:
Water, Carrots (35%), Onions, Modified Cornflour, Rapeseed Oil, Sugar, Salt, Cream (Milk), Dried Skimmed Milk, Coriander, Black Pepper, Stabilisers - Polyphosphates and Sodium Phosphates.
Is there a way of knowing how much of added sugar is in such products? Does it all go into 4.1g and it’s just a guessing game what the maximum of added sugars or its substitutes might be — 4.1g? Or added sugar is above 4.1g and undisclosed?
Unless the nutrition label explicitly lists added sugars, there is no way to know for sure. In the US, it’s required to explicitly list added sugar on the nutrition label now. For other countries, I’m not sure what the regulations are.
For the specific soup that you’re referring to, the amount of added sugars must be <4.1g because multiple ingredients in the soup contain naturally occurring sugars. For example, 35g of carrots would contain 1.7g natural sugar. Onions, cream, and milk also contain natural sugar.