Ue food: clearer labels for consumers

Calories, fats, and salt contained in a certain food will have to be clearly expressed on the front label of every kind of food sold in Europe. But they will have to be clearly expressed also in restaurant menus, in the canteens and on every single product just to avoid allergic people run the risk of some serious consequences. It is the new model of nourishment and food label proposed by the European Commission to the 27 member-states, the E.U. is really convinced to renew labels because the old ones were too confused. The Commission wants the new labels to be applied also to the so-called "alcohol pops"fruitjuices blended with alcohol, wide- spread among young people; they won't be applied on wine, beer and alcoholic drinks instead. Bruxelles focuses on essential nutritional information, clearly written and readable.
The E.U. fixed the writing dimension, which must reach 0,1181 in. at least. This way, while buying a product the consumer will be immediately given key-information about its energetic value: e.g. how many calories this food provides, fats levels and the presence of saturated fats, the most dangerous for our health, with particular reference to carbohydrates (sugar and salt), very important for those who suffer from diabetes or high blood pressure. Everything is expressed per portion or every 100 mgr of food. The label will also show the suggested amount per day, just to inform people about the problem of obesity. A better protection against the allergens will avoid many anaphylactic shocks which for the 70%of cases are caused by unpackaged food. The new proposal made by the Europe Health Advisor Markos Kyprianou gives few possibilities to show the origin of the products on the label, an argument Italy particularly cares about to fight frauds and food -alteration. His law introduces in fact a better flexibility to show in a facultative way, and under certain conditions, the origin of food( according to the other present laws, for example in agriculture or in the union market). As for the compulsory origin label, as Italy would like for its olive oil, Kyprianou has affirmed " we are clearing up this point". On this compulsory origin label for the olive oil Kyprianou is collaborating with the agricultural advisor Mariann Fisher Boel. There is some expectation to check the possible availability of the agricultural responsible to change EU rules about olive oil. Besides within this year the green book on the possible options about quality, labelling and protected sitemaps is expected.