Dietary Reference Intakes for Japanese (2020): General Remarks and Expectations in Relation to Nutritional Research

Fukui Date C （2013） Within-and between-individ-ual variation in energy and nutrient intake in Japanese adults: effect of age and sex difference on group size and number of records required for adequate dietary assessment. J Epidemiol 23 : 178-86 . Summary : “ Dietary Reference Intakes for Japanese ” [DRIs], published by the Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare, is the only comprehensive guideline for diet and nutrition available in Japan. This review introduces the main points that it contains, with particular reference to the recent revision, and discusses the relationship between the DRIs and nutritional research, with a view to developing future versions. Although the revisions of the values in the DRIs have been minimal, some of the definitions and their usage have been revised and ex-plained in more detail. Issues related to how dietary intake standards are formulated on the basis of scientific reports are also covered, especially systematic reviews and meta-analyses of previous nutritional studies. The most important message seems to be that data from research on this field in Japan has not been sufficient in ei-ther quantity or quality for development of the DRIs, and there is a concern that this may hinder the development of new versions in the near future. It is hoped that researchers working in the field of food and nutrition will tackle this issue and respond positively to this statement. This article does not reflect the official opinion of the Japanese government.