The Nutrition Facts panel found on many food packages, that most of us have been scanning in grocery aisles for the past 20 years, is expected to undergo some significant changes starting this week. According to a recent press release from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), the agency is planning to update the … Continue Reading
Coauthored by Andrea Canfield and Claire Mitchell: The Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS), the division of the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) charged with regulating the safety and proper labeling of meat, poultry, and egg products, recently approved the Non-GMO Project Verified label claim for meat and liquid egg products. The label, certified by the … Continue Reading
On Tuesday, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) announced that bisphenol A (BPA) is now formally banned from use in baby bottles and sippy cups. The announcement came as a surprise to some as the FDA had only just recently, on March 30, 2012, issued a decision to deny a petition by the Natural … Continue Reading
In following up from a previous Food Liability Law blog post that was recently published on Law360, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) announced on Friday, March 30, 2012, that is was denying a petition by the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) to ban the use of Bisphenol A (BPA) in food and beverage packaging … Continue Reading
Bisphenol A (BPA) is an industrial chemical that has been present since the 1960s in plastic used in consumer products, including reusable water bottles, sippy cups, and baby bottles, to prevent cracking. BPA is also used in the protective lining inside metal-based food and beverage cans to avoid corrosion. In recent years BPA has become … Continue Reading
Here’s a link to an article that appeared recently in Inside Washington’s FDA Week concerning the issue of front-of-package labeling (FOP). The article takes aim at the debate about state vs. federal regulation of FOP labeling. Here’s a link to a recent post in this blog on the FOP issue.… Continue Reading
Yes, someone has actually filed a putative class action on the basis that she was “mislead by the packaging and marketing, which she argues convey the message that the Product contains real, nutritious fruit.” U.S. District Judge England in the Eastern District of California dismissed the complaint captioned as Sugawara v. Pepsico, Inc. Though Sugawara seems purely … Continue Reading
Bill Marler funded independent research at the University of Idaho to study the adequacy of cooking instructions found on the packaging on various retail brands of frozen ground beef patties. The research was published this month in Food Protection Trends. The study found that three of the packages included cooking instructions that “would be inadequate … Continue Reading
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration is taking issue with claims that Cheerios cereal can lower cholesterol. In a letter to General Mills, the FDA says that statements made on Cheerios packaging like the claim that the cereal is “clinically proven to help lower cholesterol” make the product a drug under federal law. The agency suggests … Continue Reading