The study was carried out to investigate the efficacy of current nutrition labeling of processed foods and examine awareness among university students of nutrition information given current nutrition labels, and also awareness of the one-serving size of snacks that come in differently sized packages. A total of 100 students in Chungbuk, Korea participated in this study. About 60% of the subjects knew about nutrition labeling; however, a very small percentage (11%) of the subjects reported an experience of being educated about nutrition labeling. Also, just 32% of the students checked nutrition labels when they purchased processed foods. When understanding of nutrition information on labels of snacks in differently sized packaging was tested, over 80% of the subjects understood nutrition information accurately. Five different package sizes were studied. Of these 5, packages containing about 200% of one standard serving showed the highest rate of misunderstanding of total energy contents per container. Interestingly, the students most strongly preferred containers that contained 300% of one standard serving. From these results, we conclude that students consider the current recommendation for a serving size to be small, which may be related to misreading of nutrition labels of snacks that come in packages containing less than 300% of one standard serving size. To improve accurate understanding of nutrition labels of snacks, total package labels or dual column labels on packages containing less than 300% of one standard serving size should be considered.

This study examined the understanding and use of information on nutrition labels based on one serving size among female consumers above the age of 20 in Seoul area. According to the survey, 69.9% of respondents were aware of the current system of nutrition labeling based on one serving size, and 51.8% of the respondents expressed their dissatisfaction with the system because the nutrition labels were difficult to understand or appeared unreliable. The nutrition label literacy of the consumers varied with respect to different packaging units. The respondents were likely to be less accurate in calculating the expected caloric intake when only portions of a multi-serving package were used. Initially 69.0% of respondents reported that they had read the nutrition label before purchasing a product but 91.9% of respondents said that they would check the label after learning how to read the label properly. It is very important to make consumers aware that the labels are very reliable sources of nutrition information. A public education campaign on the use of nutrition labels should focus on developing the consumers' ability and skills in using the label information when choosing foods.

The purpose of this study is to establish the one serving size of Korean Processed Food. Defining the one serving size is very important for nutrition labeling and foodservice operation, because the one serving size is used to set up a proper portion by each foodservice operation. The basic data of 200 items were collected through three methods. Searching many cookbooks, exploring the commercial and noncommercial foodservices -6 industrial foodservices, 100 nationwide elementary school foodservice recipes analysis, and 3 hospital foodservice systems as the samples - moreover, experimental cooking and sensory evaluation by trained panels were conducted to assess quantity preference of selected food items. All data were rearranged through food type, that is, main dish, side dish, dessert and health food. One serving sizes of processed foods showed wide variety according to the different menus that include selected food items. Therefore, means and ranges of serving size by three research methods were presented item by item. The results obtained were: 1. The Korean Processed Foods were dried and sugar adding and soused foods, and many of them used the natual processing methods. 2. There were wide varieties in the classification of main dishes, but many of them were cereals, noodles, and sugar products. One serving size of noodles were around 50~100 g, cereals were 20~40 g, which means the one serving size can be differenciated by the food usage. 3. According to the Food classification of side dishes, many of them were as following; natural dried foods, processed fish products, salted or sugar added foods, seasoned foods and sugar products. Moreover the Types of cooking in side dishes were almost culinary vegetables, teas, health foods and condiments, and soused fish products. 4. About desserts, they were almost teas and sugars, and the Types of cooking were teas, health foods and seasonings. 5. We can conclude that almost Korean Processed foods used the drying and soused processing methods for long-time preservation, but it can make the higher content of any special elements, such as sodium or carbohydrates.