A new law has entered into force in Italy that reinstates the obligation to indicate on the label of food products the production and/or packaging establishment.
This obligation, which will cover only food produced in Italy and intended for the Italian market, had been eliminated from EU Regulation 1169/2011, in force since December 2014.
The adoption of the law is the result of a process lasting nearly two years, coordinated by Italy’s Ministry of Agriculture and counting with the support of associations and the public opinion.
In fact, an online public consultation conducted by the Ministry of Agriculture revealed that 96.5% of Italians request a compulsory indication of the origin of all foods.
According to Italy’s Minister for Agricultural Policies, Maurizio Martina, the indication of the production/packaging establishment will "ensure that correct and complete information is provided to the consumer as well as better and immediate food traceability by the control bodies, including a more effective protection of health''.
He added that there could be cases where ''such an indication may be provided alternatively by means of words, marks or equivalent codes that still allow easy tracing of the location and the address of the manufacturing/packaging facility''.
© 2016 European Supermarket Magazine – your source for the latest retail news. Article by Branislav Pekic. To subscribe to ESM: The European Supermarket Magazine, click here.
