Martin Holle

European Food and Feed Law Review, Volume 9 (2014), Issue 5, Page 280 - 284

Nocumentum documentum – learn from your mistakes. One would expect that the golden rule expressed in this Latin proverb applies not only to the management of companies but equally to the European law-making process, certainly in times of Better and Smart Regulation. Like so often in real life, aspiration and reality do not always meet. A recent example of this is Article 24 of the European Commission´s proposal on a revised Regulation on novel foods.

Martin Holle, Enrico Togni, Arianna Vettorel

European Food and Feed Law Review, Volume 9 (2014), Issue 3, Page 148 - 160

I. Introduction The UK Front of Pack Nutritional Label (hereinafter FoP) is, according to the UK Food Standard Agency and to the UK Health Minister, a powerful tool to help consumers make healthier food choices. On the basis of consumer research commissioned a few years earlier1,UKPublic health authorities argue that consumers are more willing to make healthy food choices when they can rely upon a single labelling format, rather than the presence in the market of multiple front-of-pack label formats. The adoption of the UK FoP labelling scheme has recently raised many concerns over its potential effect ofmarket distortion and fragmentation, especially among those Member States whose food products would be negatively affected by such labelling requirements.2 While the European Commission´s response to the Italian request in the Standing Committee meeting on 3 October 2013 has already been harshly criticised3, there is still merit in analysing whether the UK FoP traffic light nutrition labelling scheme is compliantwith EUFood Law.