The Nutrition and Health Claims Regulation (EC) No 1924/2006 became applicable on 1 July 2007. It focuses on nutrition and health claims made in foods and food supplements, with the aim of harmonising the legal situation across the EU.
The regulation:
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sets general principles for all claims
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determines what claims can and cannot be made
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establishes a procedure for new claims to be made
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states which foods will not be able to make claims
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applies to commercial communications, i.e. labelling, presentation and advertising of products
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will have an important impact on all commercial messages promoting food and food supplement products.
Notably, the regulation requires the scientific substantiation of claims and pre-market approval of all claims used, which involves a review by the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA). It also provides for the establishment of a list of approved claims based on generally accepted scientific evidence (article 13 list).
While EHPM welcomes legislation that allows the use of health claims and disease risk reduction claims across the entire EU, there is serious cause for concern in terms of the type of evidence EFSA needs to substantiate claims, uncertainty regarding the scope of certain types of claims, and transitory periods, all of which need to be clarified.
In the absence of Commission or EFSA guidelines, EHPM took the lead, in co-operation with other stakeholders (ERNA, CIAA), to develop guidance for its members on a substantiation methodology for claims, and successfully launched a collection exercise of claims at EU level. This list of claims was submitted to the European Commission through various EU member states. The European Commission then consolidated the various member state lists into one, which was passed on to EFSA for evaluation. To date EFSA has published three batches of claims opinions.
EHPM is closely monitoring developments at EFSA, particularly the discussions on the criteria for claims evaluation. We continue our dialogue with EFSA and the European Commission to ensure a balanced and smooth implementation of the regulation, through a practical interpretation of its provisions.