01/07/14 - With the main elements of the Food Information to Consumers EU 1169/2011 Regulation (FIC) due to come into effect in less than 7 months’ time, a snapshot analysis of the industry’s journey toward compliance has revealed some common labelling  issues and misconceptions  in the products tested.

GS1 UK commissioned Camden BRI to provide a snapshot of progress by analysing a basket of products. 20 samples were selected for the basket, with five each from the prepared ready meals, meat, confectionery and flour and bakery wares categories. Four of the 20 products tested were compliant, with a further four only requiring minor changes to reach it.

The mandatory requirements of FIC are applicable to 12 key information areas, and achieving compliance in some of these is necessarily more complex than for others. It is at the actual point of interpreting some of these changes that issues appear to be arising for affected businesses, which could become very costly to correct and lead to enforcement action after the regulation comes into effect.

The common issues and misconceptions identified from the analysis include:

• Declaring nutrition information -  A range of layouts were found in the survey. It remains the case that nutrition formats seen on some imported products from outside the EU are not acceptable on products sold in the EU and may not co-exist on a label with the format set out in FIC where there is a new ordering of nutrients and salt must be declared in place of sodium.

• Country of origin statements– declaring the country of origin or place of provenance on  foods is one of the more complex areas of FIC, as the requirements can vary in accordance with the product type and ingredients and there is legislation following FIC that could very well change the current understanding of what is required. This would appear to be posing a particular challenge for meat businesses; none of the statements used on the products tested were found to be fully compliant with FIC at the time of the survey.

• Multilingual labelling – FIC sets out a minimum font size for use on product labelling, which can represent a significant challenge for smaller products. This was particularly found to be the case where multiple languages are  declared on a single label.

Gary Lynch, CEO at GS1 UK comments: “Compliance with  FIC is proving to be a complex process for industry, as it comprises many different areas and can involve multiple teams and in some cases thousands of products, each with different size labels and different requirements specific to the ingredient type. We recommend that all businesses involved in the supply and sale of food and drink products aim to be compliant well in advance of the 13th December deadline, to help avoid bottlenecks and ensure contingency measures can be put in place should final labelling errors be found.“

Notes to Editors
 
About GS1 UK 

For further information or requests for interviews, please contact Tim Haidar: 020 7092 3584 / Tim.Haidar@gs1uk.org.
 
For more than 35 years GS1 UK has been working with its members to enable the efficient movement of goods and sharing of information. It drives supply chain efficiency alongside 111 other not-for-profit GS1 member organisations in 150 countries worldwide.
 
Having introduced the first truly global bar code numbering system in 1973, at least five billion GS1-compliant bar codes are now scanned everyday – making it the most widely used supply chain standards system in the world. GS1 identification numbers are now also commonly used in RFID tags, Electronic Data Interchange (EDI) messages and for real-time global data exchange.
 
Providing independent support, GS1’s team of technical and business consultants also assist members with on-site implementation of appropriate supply chain information solutions.
 
Its 28,000+ UK members range from SMEs to major UK companies and include grocery retailers and food service companies, food manufacturers, healthcare and pharmaceuticals companies, and NHS Trusts. Its supervisory board includes senior directors from Tesco, Morrisons and Sainsbury’s, as well as Unilever, P&G, Diageo and the NHS.
 
GS1 UK actively supports The Food Chain – a UK charity set up to ensure that people living with HIV can access the nutrition they need to lead healthy, independent lives. For more information, visit www.foodchain.org.uk 
 
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