Food Labels: Ingredient listing and new food standards code 2000.

Ingredient listing and new food standards code 2000

Ingredients are listed in descending order by weight or quantity

Percentage of Key Ingredients in a product must now be shown under the new food standards code 2000

Example: Weet-Bix are described as "Wholegrain Breakfast biscuits"
Ingredients: wholewheat (97%), raw sugar, salt, malt extract, vitamins (niacin, thiamin, riboflavin, folate), mineral (iron). The key or characterising ingredient in Weet-bix is whole wheat and this makes up 97% of the product by weight.

Products must provide warning statements for ingredients that can cause allergy health risks e.g seafood, fish, gluten, milk, soybeans, eggs, royal jelly.

Products must provide warning statements for ingredients/ substances which have a potential health risk e.g added caffeine or where ingredient has similar action to caffeine e.g guarana (a herb which contains caffeine).

Ingredients that belong to a particular 'class'

Audio Transcripts

The first ingredient is present in the food in the largest amount, while the last ingredient is present in the lowest amount - this also applies to water . If water makes up less than 5% of the finished food it does not need to be declared. If the second ingredient on a label is sugar, for example, then the product contains quite alot of sugar!

The Australian New Zealand Food Standards code has introduced a new labelling requirement regarding the ingredient list. You will now be able to see on a food label the exact proportion of the key or characterising ingredients (i.e ingredients used in the name or description of the product on the label). The key ingredient will not necessarily be the main ingredient in terms of mass, but it will be the ingredient which gives the food its character. For example, you will now be able to tell what percentage of a "meat" pie is actually "meat".

Food manufacturers do not have to list actual ingredients if they belong to a class. For example, if a product contains palm or coconut oil then it can be listed as 'vegetable oil'. This can be quite confusing and misleading for consumers who are trying to reduce their intake of saturated fat, but the NIP should make up for this.