Food composition database of products available on the Spanish market in 2022: A tool for the design, implementation and monitoring of policies to improve food environments

Branded food composition databases, such as the Food composition database of products available on the Spanish market in 2022, reflect consumer purchasing options and are valuable tools in the field of nutrition. This study identifies the categories that most contributed to sugar, saturated fat, and salt in the Spanish shopping basket in 2022; categories with higher nutrient median content; and categories with higher nutrient content variability (interquartile range and coefficient of variation). Cakes contributed 27.60% to the total sugar, Cheese accounted for 20.48% of saturated fats, and Processed meat represented 32.34% of salt. Using the 75th percentile of the overall database, which comprises 29,575 products, as a benchmark, it was observed that Chocolate , Ice cream , Cakes , and Breakfast cereals exhibited the highest median sugar content, exceeding 10.6 g/100 g. Additionally, Cheese , Chocolate , Butter and other Fats and Ice cream demonstrated the highest median saturated fat content, surpassing 7 g/100 g. Furthermore, Processed meat and Cheese were identified as having the highest median salt content, exceeding 1.4 g/100 g. Among the twenty food categories analyzed, the coefficient of variation exceeded 50% in 16 categories for sugar content, in 18 categories for saturated fat content, and in 17 categories for salt content. These results support the usefulness of branded food composition databases in the design, implementation, and evaluation of public health policies.