Committee Summary Record, 23 June 2008

LABELLING - Committee Discussions: Exchange of views and possible opinion on the revision of Council Directive 90/496/EEC on nutrition labelling for foodstuffs – technical issues

The following is an extract from the summary record of the meeting of the Standing Committee on the Food Chain and Animal Health: Section on General Food Law held on 23 June 2008

The draft Directive amending Council Directive 90/496/EEC aims at:

• providing a definition of "fibre" for the purpose of nutrition labelling;
• completing the list of conversion factors to be used for calculating the energy value of certain nutrients;
• updating the list of vitamins and minerals which may be declared and their recommended daily allowance.

From the discussion which took place, it appeared that, with regards to the definition of fibre, all delegations which expressed their view, except one, agreed with the definition proposed. However, in order to clarify the text, a slight modification was agreed in the wording of Article 1 (1). The question of methods of analysis was raised by some Members States. The Commission explained that the possibility to determine method(s) of analysis by comitology as foreseen by Directive 90/496/EC is maintained. However, at this stage it would consider together with Member States the opportunity to develop guidelines on this subject.

Regarding energy conversion factors, there was a debate as to the desirability of extending the list of specific conversion factors. The issues that were considered related to:

• simplified legislation principles;
• cost of providing more accurate information about energy of products by operators, especially SMEs, and of controls by national authorities;
• relevance of the resulting precision and consequent benefit for the consumer.

Several delegations expressed the view that specific conversion factors should be defined for certain substances in view of considering their addition to the list in the future. The Commission undertook to request EFSA's opinion on specific conversion factors for polydextrose and tagatose.

Member States were thus able to accept the relevant section of the draft Regulation as such.

Finally, the proposed amended list of vitamins and minerals did not give rise to comments.

The SCFCAH gave a favourable opinion by qualified majority (in favour: 306 votes; abstentions: 29 votes; absent: 10 votes).