01.EU plans to extend labelling laws
The European Union is a step closer to enforcing mandatory country of origin labelling on chicken, lamb and pork after EU Ministers voted in favour of the proposal on Tuesday. The rules currently in place apply to beef, veal, fruit and vegetables but the current plans involve extending them to lamb, pork and poultry. The draft could also be extended to include milk and products that contain milk or meat as an ingredient.
The Australia New Zealand Food Standards Code currently requires nearly all packaged foods to carry a country of origin label. However, the labels 'Made in Australia', 'Australian Made' and 'Manufactured in Australia' are not necessarily a guarantee that the product is from Australia. CHOICE wrote a detailed submission to the Food Labelling Review Panel asking for clarification of country of origin labelling laws so consumers can identify precisely which products are Australian. The report from the review is due in January.
In a CHOICE survey conducted earlier in the year, consumers identified country of origin labelling as a priority, along with nutrition information.