Sweden Issues Regulation to Ensure Safety of Infant Food Packaging

[ppzhan Abstract] After announcing measures last May to ban BPA in food packaging materials for infants and young children, Sweden recently published regulations banning BPA in food packaging coatings and linings for children under 3 years old. Sweden thus became the fifth EU member state to adopt a decree banning BPA in specific materials or products.

Recently, the Swedish Code of Statutes (SFS) published regulation SFS 2012:991, banning bisphenol A (BPA) in food packaging coatings and linings for children under 3 years old. The new rule amends food regulation 2006:813 and will take effect on July 1, 2013. In May 2012, the Swedish Ministry of Environment had announced measures to ban BPA in food packaging materials for children under 3 years old. By approving the new measures, Sweden became the fifth EU member state after Austria, Belgium, Denmark and France to formulate some form of ban on BPA in specific materials and/or products.

BPA is an estrogen-like substance that may have a serious impact on the human endocrine system and can cause pathological changes in the cardiovascular, intestinal and reproductive systems; long-term use of products containing BPA may cause serious harm to the growth and development of children and infants.

At present, the main EU and member state regulations banning the use of BPA are as follows: EU Regulation (EU) 10/2011 stipulates that the BPA content of food contact materials shall not exceed 0.6 mg/kg; EU Regulation (EU) 321/2011 stipulates that polycarbonate baby bottles for children under 1 year old are prohibited from containing BPA. Austria bans BPA in pacifiers and teething gel products; Danish and Belgian regulations ban BPA in food contact materials and articles for children under 3 years old. French regulations ban BPA in food contact materials and articles for children under 3 years old, and from January 1, 2015 will ban BPA in all food contact materials and articles. It can thus be seen that regulations on banning the use of BPA in food contact products are gradually becoming stricter.

Food contact products are one of the characteristic industries of the Ningbo region. According to statistics, in 2012 Ningbo exported 28,300 batches of food contact products, with a value of over 471 million US dollars, up 20.94% and 14.32% year on year respectively. Export enterprises in Ningbo should pay sufficient attention to the increasingly strict BPA bans.

Inspection and quarantine departments suggest that relevant enterprises: First, actively pay attention to new developments in such foreign regulations and, at the same time, strengthen communication with customers to keep informed in a timely manner; second, improve processes and formulas, strictly control the quality of raw materials, and choose more environmentally friendly and healthy materials for making infant and child products; third, strengthen contact with inspection and quarantine departments, actively inquire about relevant new foreign laws and regulations, actively cooperate with the product inspection work of inspection and quarantine departments, ensure the quality and safety of export products, and avoid unnecessary losses to enterprises caused by notifications and recalls.

—This article is reprinted from China Packaging Network (pack.cn); original link: http://news.pack.cn/show-361910.html