QUEBEC CITY (May 13, 2011)—After years of foot-dragging, a global standard-setting body decided this week at negotiations in Quebec City to begin crafting an international legal standard for mandatory nutrition labelling. Standards developed by the Codex Food Labelling Committee (CCFL, part of a joint Commission of the United Nations World Health Organization and Food and Agriculture Organization) are recognized as authoritative by the World Trade Organization (WTO) for resolving international trade disputes. Because WTO rules require that laws governing imported foods to be no stricter than laws governing internal trade, the practical effect of WTO rules is to place limits on virtually all national food labelling laws, globally. A drafting group, led by the government of Australia, will begin preparing the standard this summer.
Some 250 delegates from 60 countries participated in the Quebec meeting. Bill Jeffery, LLB, negotiated for the International Association of Consumer Food Organizations (IACFO), an officially recognized observer to Codex. He is also the Canadian-based National Coordinator for the Centre for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI). Jeffery made the following statement:
The Committee’s decision to embrace mandatory (back-of-pack) nutrition labelling is long overdue acceptance that fully informed choice and public health need to be closer to the top of the Committee’s agenda. Stronger Codex standards lead to stronger national consumer and health protection laws. While Codex rules generally act as a ceiling, not a floor, for national health and consumer protection laws, some countries use them as the starting point for their domestic laws and all governments are reticent to stick out their necks by enacting stronger national standards.[i][1] At every annual meeting IACFO has attended since joining Codex in 1998, it has pressed the Committee to develop a standard for mandatory nutrition labelling.
The food label can either be a regulation-driven tool for best informing consumers and protecting the public’s health, or a minimally restrained gimmick for companies to hoodwink consumers in ways that often undermine their health. While this week’s action on mandatory labelling is encouraging, the Committee has long been reluctant to help its parent body, the World Health Organization, implement its “Global Strategy on Diet, Physical Activity and Health” to curb the human and economic toll of diet-related diseases since receiving a formal request to do so in 2006. This week alone, the Committee:
- refused to develop model mandatory rules for objective front-of-pack symbols (such as the traffic light symbols now being tested in the United Kingdom) which are widely viewed as more effective than back-of-pack labels in helping consumers pick nutritious foods,
- resisted explicitly blocking the use of individual nutrition claims (like “no salt added” or “sugar free”) on foods that are high in sodium, bad fats or low in beneficial nutrients and ingredients; and
- reluctantly agreed to further consider permitting nutritious substitute ingredients such as unsaturated oils, non-caloric sweeteners, and low-sodium additives in foods like cheese, and processed fruits and vegetables, where existing Codex standards currently permit only the use of nutritionally troublesome sugars, salt, and saturated fats.
On September 19-20, 2011, world leaders—possibly including Prime Minister Stephen Harper—will convene at the United Nations headquarters in New York City to hold a “High Level Summit on the Prevention and Control of Non-Communicable Diseases.” That meeting aims to strike a global strategy to tackle cardiovascular diseases, cancer, diabetes, and chronic respiratory diseases caused by poor diet, as well as tobacco, excess alcohol consumption, and physical inactivity. It remains to be seen whether or how Codex committees will be effective in helping to achieve the expectations of the United Nations. What seems clear is that Codex harmonizes toward dominant current regulatory approaches, but reducing the human, economic and development toll of nutrition-related disease calls for doing things differently. Policy reforms to improve health should be based on the best available evidence, the best laws, and sensible innovative regulations, not more of the same old policies that have proved ineffective or counter-productive at preventing disease. And, too often, a lack of complete evidence is used as an excuse by Codex and national governments for clinging to the status quo or doing nothing.
The human and economic costs of doing nothing to prevent nutrition-related diseases are enormous and born by everyone and all industry sectors, not just food companies. According to health experts, nutrition-related risk factors are responsible for 45,000 deaths annually in Canada,[ii][2] and more than 14 million worldwide.[iii][3]
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For more information, call: Bill Jeffery, National Coordinator of CSPI at 613-244-7337 (est. 1). The agenda of the meeting can be found here at ftp://ftp.fao.org/codex/ccfl39/fl39_01e.pdf
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Bill Jeffery, LLB, National Coordinator
International Association of Consumer Food Organizations (IACFO)
c/o Centre for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI)
Suite 2701, CTTC Bldg.
1125 Colonel By Drive
Ottawa, Ontario K1S 5R1 Canada
Tel: 613-244-7337 (ext. 1)
jefferyb@istar.ca
http://www.cspinet.ca
Thank-you to everyone who joined us in Ottawa on October 25-26 for CHAMPIONING PUBLIC HEALTH NUTRITION 2010. Conference PowerPoint presentations are now available at http://www.cspinet.ca/www.cspinet.ca/ Stay tuned for details about our next event. CSPI is an independent health advocacy organization with offices in Ottawa and Washington. CSPI's advocacy efforts are supported by more than 100,000 subscribers to the Canadian edition of its Nutrition Action Healthletter, on average, one subscribing household within a one block radius of every Canadian street corner.
CSPI does not accept industry or government funding and Nutrition Action does not carry advertisements.
[i][1] From the early-1960s until the mid-1990s, international food labelling rules were non-binding. Then the World Trade Organization (WTO) deemed Codex standards to be the maximum consumer and health protection that national governments could set without violating international law. Governments, food companies, and health and consumer protection advocates soon recognized that Codex standards exerted downward pressure on such laws. For instance, Canada’s national mandatory nutrition labelling exceeds the current Codex standard, so would be vulnerable to a WTO trade challenge brought by another country unless Canada could convince arbitrators that the additional protections were justified.
[ii][2] World Health Organization. Global Health Risks: Mortality and burden of disease attributable to selected major risks. 2009. WHO. Geneva. p. 17. Available at: http://www.who.int/healthinfo/global_burden_disease/GlobalHealthRisks_report_full.pdf See: Statistics Canada. Mortality, Summary List of Causes. 2006. Ottawa. Catalogue no. 84F0209X which indicates the total number of deaths in 2006 was 228,079, of which 20% is approx. 45,000 deaths.
[iii][3] WHO. Risk factor estimates for 2004. www.who.int/healthinfo/global_burden_disease/risk_factors/en/index.html
Beaglehole, Bonita, et al. Priority actions for the non-communicable disease crisis. 2011. The Lancet. Available at: www.thelancet.com