EU Regulation on Nutrition & Health Claims made on products sold under food law

One of the most important pieces of legislation for consumers to have come into effect in the last couple of years is the EU Nutrition and Health Claims Regulation. While we must assume the legislation is intended to protect consumers from false or misleading claims and increase consumer confidence in the information available to them, in effect it keeps crucial information from us!

The Regulation covers three types of health claims;

1.Claims based on generally accepted scientific evidence, such as “calcium helps build strong bones”

2.Reduction of disease risk claims such as “lowers cholesterol”

3.Claims referring to children’s development and health such as “calcium is good for children’s growth”

It covers nutrition claims made on food packaging, also on websites and other advertising or marketing literature.

The Regulation aims to protect the consumer by ensuring that health claims are only used if they are included on an EU register of claims which have been assessed and approved by the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA). In additional, only nutrition claims which are included in the Annex to the Regulation can be used on foods.

So far so good - however, while no doubt the Regulation has good intentions, its implementation will leave us devoid of useful information on most everyday products. This is simply because many products will no longer be able to make the general health claims that for many years have provided us with much needed basic advice about the health benefits. We will no longer be allowed to make our own informed and safe decisions.

This paradoxical situation follows from the fact that EFSA is applying the wrong type of assessment procedure on these general claims.

Even though the Regulation itself states that health claims based on generally accepted scientific evidence should undergo a different type of assessment and authorisation, EFSA is now applying an inappropriate pharmaceutical model to foods! As a consequence of this unrealistic stringent standard, claims which have been established for decades, based on generally accepted evidence, no longer live up to these new standards ~ that were never intended for them in the first place!

All this now prevents us - the consumer- from being properly advised and therefore less able to make informed choices about the products we wish to use. Surely that cannot be the intended consequence of the Regulation!

If these new Commission Regulations are approved, the EFSA Opinions could be law by September 2010. Further Opinions are expected in the summers of 2010 and 2011.

The expectation is that only 5% of over 4,000 claims submitted will receive a favourable Opinion. That would be a disaster for everyone! Again, this is the domain of Commissioner John Dalli (Malta). We have no idea as yet what his attitude towards this issue actually is.

You don’t have to be a genius to realise that thousands of products will be lost; the costs and the time required to substantiate any claim that might be acceptable is massive and unaffordable – and that many top brands and companies will simply disappear.

Where does that leave YOU ~ the CONSUMER?

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