



Last week we discussed how freshly squeezed fruit juices may not be as healthy as you may have been lead to believe, so this week we decided to follow up on the whole sugary drink aspect, by comparing the sugar-contents of popular beverage choices found in every Family Mart, All Days and other convenience stores across China.





When reading this, we want you to keep in mind ONE important fact: The World Health Organization recommends a MAXIMUM DAILY sugar intake for adults of around 25 grams (or six teaspoons) for women and 36 grams (nine teaspoons) for men (1).









- Coca Cola -





The poster-child of soft-drinks and the leader of carbonated beverages with a worldwide market share of 48% (2). Everyone knows that Coke isn't healthy, but how much sugar are you actually consuming when you drink one standard bottle of Coca Cola?





First of all, instead of the 500ml bottle you may be used to back home, the standard bottle of Coke here in China is 600ml, something you may not notice with a casual glance. This super-sized version contains a staggering 63.6 grams of sugar.





Because grams of sugar may not be an easy thing to imagine, we've used a measure that we believe most of us can understand - the humble shot glass.







Almost two shot glasses (1.8 shot glasses to be exact)





Coke not only leads the pack in terms of market share, it also has one of the highest amounts of sugar per millilitre, so how do others stack up?







- Gatorade -





The world famous sports drink, manufactured by the PepsiCo company and the leader of sports drinks in the U.S.A., taking approximately 75% of the market share (3).





Designed and created for the purpose of fuelling athletes by replacing lost body fluids after physical exertion, it's now widely seen as a healthy soda alternative - but is it?





At 6 grams of sugar per 100ml - no, it isn't - the typical Gatorade bottle is 600ml and contains 36 grams of sugar, which translates to exactly one shot glass of sugar! Unless you are engaging in extreme cardio-intensive sports, and need a quick boost we really recommend you steer clear of this option.







Fancy a shot of sugar? We didn't think so.









- Ice Tea -





A favourite amongst consumers in China and you'd think that being a simple Iced tea it wouldn't have too many issues... Sadly, you'd be wrong. One bottle contains 53.35 grams of sugar. That's just marginally under 1 and a half shot glasses per 550ml bottle.





Though it always seemed like a nice refreshing choice, maybe you'll think twice about choosing it as an option?









- Milk Tea -





One of the many milk tea varieties available on the shelves, this particular brand boasts 46 grams of sugar per 500ml bottle, which translates to roughly 1 and a quarter shots of sugar.









- Dole Fruit Juices -

We talked about fresh fruit juice and its deceiving amount of sugar, but we didn't mention the bottled juices - so here we are, Dole fruit juice. Dole's orange juice has 24.5 grams of sugar per 250ml bottle, whereas Dole's apple juice contains 29.25 grams for the equivalent amount.





For comparison 250ml of coca cola contains 26.5 grams of sugar, who would have though that Dole's apple juice actually contained significantly more sugar per millilitre than Coke does













When looking at the bottles and shot glasses side by side, you can appreciate the amount of sugar the sits inside these "fast fruit juices".







Even though it can contain other nutrients, fruit juice really isn't a super-healthy choice, regardless of the marketing hype you may see. As we mentioned in our last article, fruit juice lacks fibre, meaning a large amount of the sugar from fruit juice gets converted to fat very quickly.









- What's next? -







So there it is, 6 popular beverage choices found commonly here in China, and all of them are either reaching or doubling the recommended daily amount of sugar you should be consuming. We need to start educating ourselves about what really goes into our diets and make small changes to improve our lives.





We hope you liked this article and it motivates you to reduce your intake of sugars. If you're looking for healthy drink options then we always recommend water - but if you're really looking for something with a bit of flavour, then subscribe to the RawRocket account, and read the upcoming article about healthy beverage choices. We will also be covering other bad beverages, and will dig further into the evils of sugar, and how many scientists believe it to be the biggest health concern of our generation.









If you enjoyed that article, please consider sharing it - also, how about checking out some of our past articles. Just press the links and go!

















Sources:

(1) - http://www.who.int/nutrition/publications/guidelines/sugars_intake/en/

(2) - http://www.statista.com/statistics/387318/market-share-of-leading-carbonated-beverage-companies-worldwide/

(3) - http://www.beveragedaily.com/Markets/PepsiCo-plans-to-distribute-Gatorade-direct-to-retailers















