New Labels for Food

How much fat is there in a can of corned beef hash? Just how nourishing is a vitamin-enriched cupcake? What is the true caloric content of a serving of diet pudding? What is the difference between orange juice and an orange-flavored drink? Questions like these have bedeviled health-and diet-conscious consumers for years. Under radical new rules announced last week by the Food and Drug Administration, people will get all that information and more on food packages.

Under consideration since last March, the new code was described by FDA Commissioner Charles Edwards as "the most significant change in American marketing since food labeling began." His description is accurate. Some of the new regulations merely clarify or expand existing rules that require only the listing of ingredients (such as beef, salt or flour) in the order of their predominance in a product. Current practice normally does not disclose nutritional components-protein, fat, carbohydrates. Other changes represent substantial shifts in the FDA'S attitudes toward informing the consumer. Among the provisions:

NUTRITIONAL LABELING will not be Universally compulsory, but it will be required on all foods to which nutrients are added, such as bread, flour, fortified milk and fruit juices. It must also be included on all products for which nutritional claims are made. Labels must include the serving size and number of servings per container, spell out the caloric, protein, carbohydrate and fat contents and list the percentages of the FDA's recommended daily allowances (RDA) of protein, vitamins and minerals.

FAT CONTENT of foods must be broken down whenever it is included on a package label. Producers must list the amounts of polyunsaturated, saturated and other fatty acids in their products. Though producers need not list the cholesterol content of food, those who choose to do so must state it both in milligrams per serving and per 100 grams of food.

SPECIAL DIETARY FOODS will be subject to five specific prohibitions. Manufacturers may not claim or imply that inadequate diet results from the soil in which a food is grown; that transportation, storage or cooking of foods may result in an inadequate diet; or that ordinary foods cannot supply adequate nutrients. Nor can they claim that dietary supplements are sufficient to prevent or cure disease. They are also prohibited from making nutritional claims for non-nutritive ingredients that are added to foods.

FLAVORINGS must be clearly identified. A vanilla pudding that contains no artificial flavoring, for example, will be called simply vanilla pudding. One that contains both natural and artificial flavorings, even if the natural predominates, will be called vanilla-flavored pudding. Puddings in which the flavoring is largely or wholly artificial will be labeled artificially flavored vanilla pudding.

VITAMINS and other supplements will come under strict new controls. Foods containing less than 50% of the RDA of any vitamin need only carry standard nutritional information on their labels. Those containing up to 150% of the RDA must meet federal standards for dietary supplements. But those containing more than 150% of the RDA must be labeled and marketed as drugs. The purpose is to curb excessive use of vitamins, which is often useless and occasionally dangerous. (The FDA has decided that such newly designated drugs would be sold over the counter, rather than by prescription.)

Reaction to the new regulations, which will affect at least 80% of the food industry and become fully effective by 1975, was mixed. Consumer groups generally agreed with Edwards that the rules marked "the beginning of a new era in...complete, concise and informative food labeling." Large food producers have not yet offered any serious objections. But manufacturers of vitamins and dietary supplements are upset by the FDA'S decision to label their products as drugs. That change will subject them to stringent testing for safety and efficacy.

Despite the possibility of court action by vitamin producers, the FDA anticipates few problems enforcing its new rules. The agency has 17 testing labs across the country to monitor products and ample authority to recall or seize those that fail to meet its standards. Del Monte and Pillsbury, two of the nation's largest food producers, already include nutritional information on the labels of their products; food chains like Safeway and National are planning to do so. Others are expected to go along to satisfy both the FDA and consumers, who are becoming increasingly sophisticated about what they eat.

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