If you would like further information, or if you have any comments about the NEVO database, please contact the NEVO team at RIVM.

Frequently asked questions

Stated below are the most frequently asked questions. If your question is not on this list you can always contact us on nevo@rivm.nl.

Yes, it is possible to request for the database NEVO online at RIVM. The database is available for free after registration and agreement to the conditions. For more information: request data.

Which reference can I use to refere to NEVO online?

The reference to be used is: NEVO online version 2023/8.0, RIVM, Bilthoven

Yes, you can. Please note that NEVO contains mostly generic foods. For calculation you can use the guidelines of EuroFIR European Food Information Resource, which are prepared for the food industry based on the EU European Union (European Union) regulation EU 1169/2011.

Yes. In NEVO all information on the source is kept, which means it is always possible to retrieve the origin of the data. NEVO online provides this information behind each nutrient in the part ‘product details’. You can see this by clicking on the food name. This information is also available in the download dataset of NEVO-online .

No. Analyzing foods is very expensive. RIVM tries to keep the nutritional information of foods up-to-date by using analytical results from other organisations, research institutes and universities, data from foreign food composition tables, information form manufacturers (NethFIR) and calculations and recipes.

No. Unfortunately it is impossible to check all values (and correct them if applicable) for each new version of NEVO-online.  The NEVO-team concentrate on one food category each version of NEVO-online. In NEVO-online 2023 category Meat substitutes and dairy substitutes is made up-to-date. In 2021 category Milk and milk products was done.

Yes, if you need previous versions of NEVO-online for your research you can send a request to nevo@rivm.nl, but not all versions are still available and the format can be different. Using former tables needs attention to some aspects. The nutritional value of products can change over time. Values can be replaced by newer analyses; this can result in some differences in nutritional value although the product itself did not change.

In NEVO total carbohydrate is given excluding dietary fibre. The amount of dietary fibre is given separately.

Yes, since NEVO online 2021 polyols are included in the avalaible carbohydrates. The amounts of carbohydrates in products with polyols are higher than in previous versions of NEVO online.

No, recent information on values of the mono- and disacharides is not available. In NEVO online the total of mono- and disacharides is shown. There is no distinction between sugars added and/or natural in the product.

We do not show amino acids in NEVO-online. Tryptophan is necessary to calculate niacin equivalents. If we have got information on tryptophan content we publish the value.

In addition to fatty acids, fat in food contains glycerol (to which three fatty acids are linked) and other compounds such as sterols and phospholipids. Products with a high content of these substances (e.g., egg and organ meats) contain relatively fewer fatty acids. The addition of the fatty acid groups (saturated, monounsaturated, polyunsaturated and trans fatty acids) is about 80-96% of the total fat content.

No recent analyses for fatty acids are available for margarine products, fats for frying and deep frying. If recipes contain these fat products as an ingredient, the fatty acid composition is also not published.  Because a lot of pastry and biscuits contain margarine, we made an estimation by use of the special ingredient 'margarine for NEVO recipes' (nevo code 5562). In this margarine an estimation of fatty acids is done by calculation based on most common oils in margarines.

Salt as such is not mentioned in NEVO online, but sodium is. 1 gram of salt (NaCl) contains 400 mg sodium. You can calculate from sodium to salt. In NEVO online sodium is the combination of sodium from natural source and from added salt.

'Ash' is a word from laboratories. When doing analyses for nutritional values the laboratory often also measures the amount of ash. This is all minerals and trace elements together.

This is probably a translation issue in The Netherlands: ('foliumzuur'): folic acid is synthetic , added to foods, and folate is natural.

No. Portion sizes in The Netherlands are available on the website of Portie-online (in Dutch).

No. In the Netherlands there are companies developing nutrient calculation programs in which NEVO data is implemented. When buying such a calculation program it is important to check if recent NEVO data is used.

The composition of the food could have been changed since the moment the value was entered in NEVO. If the food is fortified another reason is possible. Some components (e.g. vitamins) decrease during time. Because of that, producers add more vitamin to the food and note the remaining value on the label. When fortified foods are analyzed for NEVO, several brands are mixed together in one sample for analysis. The values can differ from an individual brand product.

Yes, please. Input and feedback are welcome. You can send us questions, remarks or mistakes with regard to NEVO by e-mail: nevo@rivm.nl.

Foods for clinical nutrition, such as tube feeding, are not present in NEVO online. For users the nutritional values should be up to date at any time, and this is not possible for us to present this i n NEVO online, because of the frequently changes in assortment and composition.

Macronutrients protein, carbohydrates, fat and water are available for almost all foods in NEVO online. The seperate fatty acids, fibre, minerals and vitamins are sometimes missing. See for more information the document Coverage rate components.

You can send an e-mail to nevo@rivm.nl with the reason why you want to see this nutrient in NEVO online. Thus we can see the nutrients missed by our users and the urgency of it. We will keep this in mind while prioritizing our work.

Foods in recipes are coded prepared as much as possible, in order to represent the loss of water, minerals and vitamins during preparation. In order to give the best fatty acids composition raw meat is coded, because fried meat in NEVO contains cooking fat.

Unfortunately we cannot answer this question. Vegetables, fruits and potatoes are plants. Things like for instance temperature, season, do they grow outside or inside, and storage of the foods influence the amount of minerals, vitamins and other compounds in the plant. In order to know the amount of minerals and vitamins in foods we need chemical analyses. Comparing values from old food composition tables with new values is difficult. There were a lot of developments, in plant growing and in methods of analyses. Unfortunately analyses are limited. For older values often it is not recorded how the sampling was done and which method was used.