European Union food laws

Food coloring is restricted by law to prevent misuse that may lead to deception of consumers related to reduced value or usability. For this purpose, the European Union implemented food colorant guidelines in 1994 based on the understanding that food coloration presents a technological need. While European Parliament and Council Directive 94/36/EC lists colors and their uses in food, the European Commission Directive 95/45/EC contains specific purity criteria for colors in foodstuffs, e.g., a maximal lead content of 20 ppm. " ... 

Van der Meulen, B. and Van der Velde, M., Food Safety Law in the European Union An Introduction, Wageningen Academic Publishers, Wageningen, 2004. 

The permission to use food colorants is bound to their safety and is strictly regulated by specific laws controlled at national and international levels. Individual country laws differ according to specihc protocols, doses, and interpretations. Currently, the European Union (EU) has authorized 43 colorants as food additives and the United States (US) has authorized about 30. ... 

After 10 years of debate, the European Parliament and the Council of the European Union issued on February 22, 1999, a framework Directive 1999l2jEC on approximation of the laws of the Member States concerning foods and food ingredients treated with... 

One could say that this work was created in the laboratory but was born out of necessity. There has been a huge need for experimental data to support the harmonization of food packaging law in the European Union and to support the effort at streamlining approval of packaging materials coming into food contact in the United States. 

The EU at this time involves 15 independent states, and one of the aims of the union is to facilitate trade among member states. To achieve the harmonization of food laws, a program was instituted to develop a common set of food laws. The EU food laws apply in all of the 15 member nations, but the enforcement remains with the individual member states. The EU is governed by three bodies, the European Council (the Council), which consists of ministers from the member countries the European Parliament, which is formed from members elected in the member countries and the European Commission (the Commission). The Commission is the working organization that develops laws. The Council approves the laws, and the Parliament has an advisory function. The EU laws, adopted by the Council, may take the following forms ... 

EEA) on 1.1.1994. The importance of this event in this context is that the EFTA countries agreed to adopt the EU food legislation in their own law. In the meantime Austria, Einland and Sweden have joined the European Union on 1.1.1995 and on 1.5.2004, the Czech Republic, Cyprus, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Slovakia and Slovenia. 

First to be mentioned is the area of the former Soviet Union with the G.U.S. countries. In all these countries food legislation is in transition from the former centralist Soviet rules to national rules. Subsequently not much more is known so far. Russia is eager to bring its Food Law and Food Standards (GOST) in line with European rules and Codex guidelines. 

Legislation and quality demands, specifically the public ones on European as well as national level, set a minimum level of quality that should be achieved as a reaction to the already mentioned food crises. For example, the European Union has issued the General Food Law (GFL), which emphasises that firms hold primary responsibility for quality in the chain. Many chains go beyond this basic level to distinguish themselves to the end consumer by setting additional, often private, quality demands. Maintaining the additional quality level needs additional efforts to avoid reputation disasters. The question that can be raised is what integration and... 

Food authentication verifies how much a food is in accordance with its label description and law [3] and it could be considered a further guarantee for the quality and safety of a foodstuff. In European Union (EU), the production and the commercialisation of food are rightly protected and regulated by several rules [4-9] always according to quality and healthy criteria, as it is better explained in the following sessions. 

Chai, J.Y., 2000. Medical device regulation in the United States and the European Union a comparative study. Food Drug Law J. 55 (1), 57-80. Available at http //www.ncbi.nlm. nih.gov/pubmed/12296349 (accessed 04.01.16). 

Many types of post-consumer plastic packaging that are not recovered by recycling are disposed of in landfills. There are many environmental advantages (see section 3.7) to be achieved by using oxo-biodegradable polyolefins in these applications but safety considerations are equally important. Keller Heckman (the US/Intemational specialist law firm) conducted the certification and validation work for TDPA formulations required by the US Food and Drug Administration. Most TDPA formulations have been cleared for use in any type of food packaging, for any type of food. Likewise, TDPA formulations are considered safe by the SCF (Scientific Committee for Food) of the European Union. 

The EU laws follow three principles related to consumer health (1) protection, (2) fraud prevention, and (3) trade barriers. The union tried to harmonize the laws of different countries, particularly in recent years when the enlargement of the European Community became dynamic. Color Directive 94/36/EC contains horizontal provisions that refer to common laws in different countries and vertical directives that apply to specific foods. The EU directives take into account the recommendations of the Scientific Committee for Food (SCF), the Codex AUmen-tarius Commission, and the Joint Food and Agriculture OrganizationAVorld Health Organization (FAOAVHO) Expert Committee on Food Additives (JECFA). 

Union E. Directive 2009/32/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council 23 April 2009 on the approximation of the laws of the Member States on extraction solvents used in the production offoodstuffs and food ingredients 2009. L141-3-L141/11. 

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