FDA finalizes Omega 3 rule

In a constituent update released earlier this month, the FDA announced that it had come to a final ruling when it comes to the amount of “omega-3 fatty acids” that foods contain. Food labels that proudly proclaim this may need to be slightly adjusted in order to reflect this shift in attitude and policy.

What’s notable about this rule, according to this bulletin, is that it defines the language that marketers can use when designing these products, including seemingly innocuous phrases like “excellent source of” when it comes to these beneficial fatty acids.

The makers of some of the products that make use of these kinds of labels might need to reconsider the printing equipment they have in order to re-package their products in time to comply with this rule. An article on this new change in Shape magazine looked at the different varieties of foods that might be affected, including eggs and cereals.

On top of this, the Shape piece also makes the point that companies who have many food products to distinguish can use this to target naturally occurring nutrients as opposed to those that are added in later as supplements.

The relevant rule devised by the FDA describes how the organization has, among other things, targeted claims of alpha-linolenic acid within seafood “because the claims were based on a reference value that was determined by a different approach than reference values already established for other nutrients.”

Consistency, then, should be your company’s guiding light, and you can keep this up by utilizing a regular printer than can make uniform pieces of packaging that you can easily apply to whatever product you manufacture.