What is RDA

Dietary standards, regardless of the name they go by – Recommended Dietary Allowances ( RDA), Recommended Nutrient Intakes, Recommended Daily Amounts of Nutrients, or Safe Intakes of Nutrients – are the average daily amounts of essential nutrients estimated, on the basis of available scientific knowledge, to be sufficiently high to meet the physiological needs of practically all healthy persons in a group with specified characteristics.

In brief, DRI is the general term for a set of reference values used to plan and assess nutrient intakes of healthy people. These values, which vary by age and gender, include:
•    Recommended Dietary Allowance (RDA): average daily level of intake sufficient to meet the nutrient requirements of nearly all (97%-98%) healthy people.
•    Adequate Intake (AI): established when evidence is insufficient to develop an RDA and is set at a level assumed to ensure nutritional adequacy.
•    Tolerable Upper Intake Level (UL): maximum daily intake unlikely to cause adverse health effects.