Nonalcoholic Beverages as Sources of Nutrients in the Average Polish Diet

The aim of the study was to analyze the sources of energy, carbohydrates, 10 minerals, and 9 vitamins from nonalcoholic beverages in the average Polish diet. For the analysis, we used data from the 2016 Household Budget Survey conducted on the representative sample of the Polish population (36,886 households, n = 99,230). According to the source of data, we included four subgroups in analyzed food category: fruit juices, vegetable juices and mixed, mineral and spring waters, and other nonalcoholic beverages. We used the cluster analysis to assess the impact of sociodemographic and economic characteristics of the households on the structure of supplying energy and nutrients from each subgroup of the nonalcoholic beverages. Our analyses have shown that nonalcoholic beverages are primarily important in providing several nutrients: vitamin C (15.9% of the total vitamin C supply), vitamin B6 (8.9% of vitamin B supply), folates (8.5% of folate supply), carbohydrates (6.8% of carbohydrate supply), calcium (5.9% of calcium supply), and magnesium (5.5% of magnesium supply). The analysis of the consumption structure of this category of food showed that the subgroup of other nonalcoholic beverages brings more than three-fourth of carbohydrates (77%), vitamin B6 and folates (76% each), and 43% of vitamin C supplied by nonalcoholic beverages. More than half (51%) of vitamin C provided by nonalcoholic beverages comes from fruit juices and the remaining 6% comes from other juices (vegetable and mixed). In the case of minerals, mineral and spring waters consumption is important as it accounts for 65% of the calcium supply and 55% of the magnesium in nonalcoholic beverages category. The share of individual subgroups of beverages in the supply of ingredients in the diet is significantly differentiated by four socioeconomic characteristics of households: family life phase, age, socioeconomic type of household, and number of people in the household. This is particularly evident in the case of other nonalcoholic beverages, that the share of this subgroup in the energy and carbohydrates supply in the households of young people, employees (both blue-collar and white-collar workers), and families with children increases to 10%. Our results show that in order to reduce the intake of free sugars and increase the intake of deficient minerals, which is crucial in preventing noncommunicable diseases (NCDs), it is necessary to encourage consumers to replace sugar-sweetened beverages (SSBs) with water and eat fruits instead of drinking juice.