ISO food standards
The International Organisation for Standardisation (ISO) will in September publish a new standard for food safety management systems, designed to ensure there are no weak links in food supply chains, including packaging. A final draft is being checked by national member organisations. ISO 22000 will specify requirements for safety management for sourcing, manufacturing, canning, boxing, bagging, bottling, delivering and selling food. Its detailed advice will apply to packaging material producers and plants that insert food into packaging.
Medical packaging
Detailed guidelines on precautions the European Union (EU) packaging industry should take to ensure its plastics are safe when used to package pharmaceuticals have been issued by the European Medicines Agency (EMEA). The EU agency has listed tests and analyses that should be made, noting how the resulting data should be stored. The guidelines cover the use of plastic packaging for a wide range of products, including creams, solutions, pills, syrups, oils and others. The key is preventing unwanted chemical reactions when pharmaceutical products are in contact with plastic packaging. (http://www.emea.eu.int/pdfs/human/qwp/435903en.pdf)
Vitamin labelling code
A detailed, comprehensive code on the packaging and labelling of vitamin and mineral food supplements is amongst 20 new food guidelines approved this month by the ruling commission of world food standards body Codex Alimentarius. Meeting in Malaysia, national delegates agreed rules insisting such packaging be not only hygienic, but that it "safeguards the other qualities" of supplements. Under the new rules, the categories, amounts contained and recommended/maximum daily consumption of particular vitamins or minerals should be mentioned on labels, as should warnings that consumers should not exceed maximum-one day amounts and that they cannot replace standard meals. Such guidelines are not compulsory, but as all Codex members include most UN countries, and all agree their contents, they swiftly become international norms reflected in local legislation.
