Lecture: regulatory requirements
in new product development
Every food product on the market should be safe, it should be proven safe or proven to be healthy.
Nutrition and health claims
Nutrition claims are based on the energy value or about the nutrients or other substances. Nutrition
claims are written down in 1924/2006, in this annex all allowed nutrition claims are described.
Vitamin C related to immune system (maybe nice for NPD).
- General function claims: can be based on generally accepted scientific evidence or newly
developed scientific evidence
- Disease risk reduction claims: important that you make a two-step.
o 14.1a: plant sterols reduce cholesterol, which is a risk factor for coronary heart
disease. You can never claim that sterols reduce heart disease!!
o 14b: about children’s growth and development.
General conditions applying to health claims
- No reference to prevention cure or treatment of disease
- Statement that a balanced and varied diet can also provide good health
- Product can never excess consumption
Commission regulation 432/2012 shows the list of permitted health claims.
Organic labelling
Regulation 2018/848, article 30.5.
You cannot say without any requirements that the product is organic, if you want to state that your
product is organic then:
- The majority of you product is of agricultural origin and 95% of these ingredients by weight
are produced organically. Ig you have a dairy beverage and the main base is milk and the
other ingredients are organic, then the product is organic if the milk is not produced
organically.
- Other added substances should be allowed in organic product. There are limitations on
additives and flavourings. There is a specific list of additives that can be used in organic
products.
- On the label you should indicate which ingredients are organic, put an astric behind it*
Other labels, private labels for organic, such as Fairtrade, Beter Leven etc. Of these private labels
they are based on a certification system. They check if you meet the requirements for the private
labels. Private labels can be national and international.
Food information to consumers
Regulation 1169/2011
There are mandatory particulars (article 9) and voluntary particulars.
, Name of the food
- Legal name: is the name set by law? This is true for cheese and bread
- In the absence of a legal name you have a customary name
- Descriptive name: used if there is no customary name or the customary name is not used,
dairy beverage with strawberry flavour.
List of ingredients
- Standing in order of weight (heaviest first)
- Some things can be left out (article 20)
- If you have a descriptive name in which you use a, ingredient, then you must indicate how
much of the amount in percentage of the ingredient in ingredient list.
Minimum durability date, use by date and date of freezing (article 24)
Storage conditions or conditions of use (article 25)
Nutritional declaration (article 30)
You should make a declaration with energy value, fats, of which saturated, carbs of which sugar,
protein and salts.
Per 100 gram or/ml. (article 32)
Per portion (article 33)
Ingredients that have allergens should indicate the allergen by making it bold.
Cereals, eggs, fish, milk, gluten, nuts, soy, mustard, celery etc.
Novel food
Regulation 2015/2283
If your food product has not be consumed before 1997 in Europe it is novel. If it novel, you need to
prove that it is safe. You can do this by proving that is was consumed to a significant degree before
May 1997. Otherwise you should go through several safety aspects (procedure).
Other food laws are:
General food law.
Regulation on food additives, lists of which additives are allowed.
Food supplements directives has some additional labelling requirements.
Lecture: food safety
It is an obligation for the producers to make sure they only place SAFE products on the market. It is
defined in the general food law but also translated into specific legal acts, such as the regulation on
the hygiene of foodstuffs (regulation (EC) No 852/2004). HCAPP is an essential requirement in food
production.
Unintentional faults can decrease the quality or even unsafe. Also, there can be intentional
adulterations. It is a food fraud case if you replace a specific ingredient for a cheaper one, it is not
that you want to do harm but risk can still occur due to this ingredient (intention is purely economic).
