La web sobre noticias y análisis de suplementos, salud y nutrición Nutraingredients.com publicó un artículo con muchas entrevistas a personalidades releventas en el ramo, entre ellas, Silvia Bañares.
“The establishment of global requirements would satisfy the triumvirate of authorities, consumers and, industry and will certainly lead to quality products, better consumer satisfaction, and health and well-being,” IPA executive director, George Paraskevakos told NutraIngredients.
Spain’s recent decision to use EU mutual recognition principles to allow the term ‘probiotic’ on-product despite an EU ban on probiotics as an unauthorised health claim, has provoked law experts to question how much longer the EU ban can last.
Domino effect?
Barcelona-based EU food law specialist, Silvia Bañares, said the European Commission would have to deal with a situation where three states: Spain, Italy and the Czech Republic were now openly defying the official EU position.
“It is really uncertain what could happen next or in the far future,” she told us. “Currently there are at least three countries admitting the ‘probiotic’ term; that means other EU member states might deal with the mutual recognition principle as well. Sooner or later this issue must be assessed by EU institutions to achieve a common position.”
Paraskevakos agreed Spain’s probiotic labelling liberation was unlikely to end with Spain.
“In choosing the EU mutual regulation principal as to why they allowed this probiotic labelling, it can and probably will open doors for other EU countries to follow suit,” he said. “Can we possibly use the adage dominos waiting to fall? This approach of harmonisation would benefit everyone in Europe.”
The principle of mutual recognition states that a product legally available in one member state should be available in all 27 member states.
Spain’s Agency for Food Safety and Nutrition (AESAN) ruled that since the common EU market was awash with products bearing ‘probiotic’ labelling in the online space, in infant formulas and follow-on formulas, and in countries like the Czech Republic and Italy, the market was thus not harmonised.
