Page 8 - Food&Drink March 2022

NEWS
A regulatory framework, a review by the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC), and new Food Standards Australia New Zealand Code (FSANZ) guidelines are three of the nine regulations made by the federal senate inquiry into plant-based labelling. Kim Berry reports.
Senate calls for greater regulation
THE senate inquiry into the labelling of plant-based protein was launched in June last year by Queensland senator Susan McDonald, who said the makers of non-meat products had to come up with their own product names rather than trading off animal protein labelling.
The inquiry was instigated despite an existing plant-based alternatives labelling and marketing working group, that had been set-up by the Minister of Agriculture in September 2020. That group had representatives from agriculture, retail, and the plant-based sector and chaired by the National
Farmers’ Federation.
The working group didn’t
come to a consensus decision about the preferred way forward, but most members agreed a voluntary approach was the preferred option.
In the senate inquiry’s report
Don't mince words: definitions of meat and other animal products, McDonald said food categories had become blurred and claims on plant-based proteins not clearly regulated.
Even though consumers are “increasingly well informed and educated” on ingredient and nutrition labelling, and while most plant-based protein
manufacturers use clear labelling and terms, “there are no labelling standards to ensure that animal terms or images are not used on plant-based protein product packaging.” she said.
The solution to that was nine recommendations on regulating the plant-based protein industry, despite the industry already being subject to complying with Australian Consumer Law and the Food Standards Australia New Zealand Act.
The Red Meat Advisory Council (RMAC) said the findings were a “common-sense approach”. Independent chair John McKillop said it was a “great outcome” for the red meat and other traditional protein sectors.
“The Inquiry’s recommendations will go a long way in helping to restore truth in labelling for Australian consumers, while ensuring animal and manufactured plant-based protein industries can compete on a level playing field,” McKillop said.
GREENS’ PUSHBACK
Meanwhile, the dissenting report by the Australian Greens largely rejected the recommendations and how the inquiry was run.
“It was a significant departure from Senate protocol, with the use of a legislation committee chaired and dominated by the government, for an inquiry that should have gone through a references committee,” it said.
Greens committee member Peter Whish-Wilson pointed out that throughout the inquiry no reliable quantitative evidence was presented that showed a systemic problem with plant-based product labelling.
Research by Colmar Brunton found 91 per cent of customers ‘have never mistakenly purchased a plant-based product
thinking it was a meat-based counterpart, or vice versa’. Evidence from Woolworths Group, The Australian Farm Institute, and the ACCC supported its findings.
The ACCC said it had only
17 reports about plant-based labelling from January 2020 to June 2021 from a total of 564,000 contacts. It said most complaints were not about being misled, but on the legality of using animal-related images or words on the label, with some of those complaints coming from meat industry bodies.
The Alternative Proteins Council (APC) said the committee’s recommendations for “restrictive regulations” were unjustified based on the balance of the evidence presented to the enquiry.
“While evidence demonstrating current labelling is fit-for-purpose appears in abundance in the Committee’s report, the Committee’s conclusions are in direct opposition, relying on a heavy-handed approach that would have broad sweeping implications on a growing sector,” the APC said.
“Evidence presented to the inquiry – from six public hearings and 226 written submissions – demonstrated: no substantive evidence of consumer confusion about plant-based product labelling, no adverse economic impact experienced by the red meat sector due to the emerging plant-based products sector, and no market failure arising from current plant-based product labelling to warrant the regulatory intervention proposed in the report.” ✷
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