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FDA Releases Final Menu-Labeling Guidance

Last updated on May 4th, 2016 at 08:53 am

The FDA on Friday released its final guidance on menu-labeling regulations, setting May 2017 as the deadline for compliance. The rule requires menu labeling at chain restaurants and “similar retail food establishments,” determined by the FDA to include grocery stores.

In response to the release of the guidance, which came as a surprise to the industry, Food Marketing Institute (FMI) President and CEO Leslie G. Sarasin offered the following statement:

“The guidance is largely a reprint of the draft guidance the agency released in September 2015 and did not incorporate the critical flexibility requested by the supermarket industry to make chain restaurant menu-labeling regulations more practical in a grocery store setting for key areas, including signage at the salad bar or hot foods bar.

“While we are pleased to have any type of guidance to assist with our challenging efforts to comply with a rule and a structure written for chain restaurants—as opposed to one that contemplates the operations of supermarkets with large and varied produce departments evolving to salad bars or seafood departments evolving to hot foods bars—the supermarket industry still seeks flexibility from FDA. Specifically, food retailers wish to preserve their opportunity to sell locally produced foods that are sold at only one or two locations as well as their ability to use one sign/menu/menu board in a prepared foods area or next to a salad bar.

“Unfortunately, FDA has been unable to address these issues through its guidance process, so we repeat the supermarket industry’s support for legislation that does address our concerns, the Common Sense Nutrition Disclosure Act (H.R. 2017/S. 2217), which passed the U.S. House of Representatives in February and is pending in the U.S. Senate.”

NACS, The Association for Convenience and Fuel Retailing, also voiced its support for congressional action.

“The FDA has done a disservice to convenience stores by willingly ignoring our industry’s interest in providing calorie information to consumers in a way that is actually helpful,” said Lyle Beckwith, NACS senior vice president of government relations. “Rather than take into account the practicality of our industry’s ability to comply with the law, the FDA has moved ahead with menu-labeling requirements designed for chain restaurants and not convenience store food service programs.”

According to Beckwith, the Common Sense Nutrition Disclosure Act, and S. 2217, its companion legislation in the Senate, would ensure consumer choice and make it possible for convenience stores to comply with the menu-labeling law.

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