The National Standard for Food Safety General Principles for Nutrition Labeling of Prepackaged Foods (GB28050-2011) stipulates the labeling requirements for nutrition labeling, so what is the relationship between the Nutrition Facts Table and nutrition labeling, and what elements are included in the Nutrition Facts Table, and how to avoid common problems? Food Partner Network has sorted out and integrated this for your reference.

Nutrition Facts Table and Nutrition Labeling

1.Definition
Nutrition labeling: prepackaged food labeling to provide consumers with food nutrition information and characteristics of the description, including the Nutrition Facts Table, nutrition claims and nutrient function claims.

Nutrition Facts Table: A standardized table labeled with the name, content and percentage of Nutrient Reference Value (NRV) of food nutrients.

2. Relationship between Nutrition Facts Table and Nutrition Labeling
From the above definition, it can be seen that nutrition labeling includes the Nutrition Facts Table. If nutrition claims or nutrient function claims are indicated on the label, it also belongs to nutrition labeling.

Basic elements of a Nutrition Facts Table

Nutrition Facts Table includes 5 basic elements: header, nutrient name, content, NRV% and box.
(1) Table header: “Nutrition Facts Table” as the header;
(2) Nutrient name: Label energy and nutrients according to the name and order of GB28050 Table 1;
(3) content: refers to the content of the value and unit of expression, such as: energy (kJ); (4) NRV%: NRV% of the energy and nutrients in the table.
(4) NRV%: refers to the energy or nutrient content as a percentage of the corresponding nutrient reference value (NRV);
(5) Box: Use the table or the corresponding form.

Frequently Asked Questions and Analysis

Ø Prepackaged food (except exempted products) not labeled with Nutrition Facts Table

Ans: The mandatory labeling of nutrition labeling for all prepackaged foods (except exempted products) includes the content values of energy, core nutrients (protein, fat, carbohydrates, sodium) and their percentages of NRVs.

Ø Character height does not meet the requirement
Ans: The requirement of “General Principles for Labeling of Prepackaged Foods of National Food Safety Standards” (GB 7718) that “when the maximum surface area of prepackaged food packages or containers is more than 35cm2, the height of the mandatory labeling content of words, symbols and numbers shall not be less than 1.8mm” is also applicable to nutrition labels.

Ø Lack of header “Nutritional Composition Table”.
Ans: Nutrition Facts Table includes 5 basic elements: header, nutrient name, content, NRV% and box. Nutrition Facts Table” should be used as the header.

Ø When ingredients other than core nutrients are labeled, the core nutrients are not prominently displayed.
Ans: Energy and 4 core nutrients are mandatory ingredients to be labeled on nutrition labels. On the nutrition labels of any prepackaged food (except exempted products), the name of energy and 4 core nutrients, the content value and the percentage of the content value to the respective nutrient reference value (NRV) should be labeled. When labeling other ingredients, appropriate forms should be adopted to make the labeling of energy and core nutrients more eye-catching, such as increasing font size, changing font (e.g. italic, bold, black), changing color (font or background color), changing alignment, etc.

Ø Prepackaged foods using nutrient enhancers are not labeled in the Nutrition Facts Table.
Ans: For prepackaged foods fortified with nutrient enhancers, the content of the nutrient in the fortified food and its percentage of NRV should be indicated in the Nutritional Composition Table. If the fortified nutrients do not belong to the range listed in Table 1 of GB 28050, the labeling order should be arranged after the nutrients listed in Table 1, but there is no requirement on the order of its arrangement.

Ø When food ingredients contain or use hydrogenated and/or partially hydrogenated fats and oils in the production process, trans fats (acids) are not labeled in the Nutritional Composition Table
Ans: When hydrogenated and/or partially hydrogenated oils and fats are contained in food ingredients or used in the production process, trans fat (acid) content should be labeled; products with hydrogenated and/or partially hydrogenated oils as main raw materials, such as margarine, shortening, phytolacca and cocoa butter, etc., should be labeled with trans fat (acid) content; however, if the above products don’t use hydrogenated oils, they can be labeled with trans fat (acid) content at the discretion of the enterprises. However, if hydrogenated oil is not used in the above products, it is up to the enterprises to choose whether or not to label the trans fatty acid content.

Ø Incorrect labeling of the name and order of nutrients, expression unit and modification interval.
Ans: Energy and nutrients should be labeled according to the name and order in Table 1 of GB 28050. When a nutrient has two names, such as niacin (niacinamide), you can choose to label “niacin” or “niacinamide”, or “niacin (niacinamide)”, saturated fat (“niacin”) can be labeled as “niacin”, and saturated fat (“niacin”) can be labeled as “niacin”. acid) can be labeled as “saturated fat” or “saturated fatty acid”, can also be labeled as “saturated fat (acid)”, etc.; the unit of expression of the nutrients should be labeled according to the requirements of column 2 of Table 1 of GB 28050. The unit of expression of nutrient content should be labeled according to the requirements of GB 28050 Table 1, column 2, and can be expressed in Chinese or English in brackets, or both can be used, but can not use other units; nutrient modification interval should be labeled according to the requirements of GB 28050 Table 1.

Ø Nutrient content value ≤ “0” threshold value, not labeled as “0”.
Answer：When the content of a nutrient ≤ “0” threshold value, should be in accordance with the provisions of GB 28050 Table 1 in the “0” threshold value, the content value is labeled as “0”, NRV% should also be labeled as 0%. The content value shall be labeled as “0” and the NRV% shall also be labeled as 0%. When the nutrient content is labeled per serving, it should also comply with the “0” threshold value per 100g or 100ml.

Ø Nutrient content labeling
Ans: The nutrient content should be expressed as a value per 100 g (100 ml) or per serving. The content of nutrients can only be labeled with specific content values, not with range values, such as “≤ XX”, “≥ XX”, “40-1000”, etc.

Ø Inaccuracy of the labeling value of the Nutritional Composition Table, exceeding the allowable error range.
Ans: Any nutritional information labeled on the nutrition label of prepackaged food should be true and objective, and no false information shall be labeled. If there is a requirement for nutrient content in the standard of the corresponding product, the nutrient content should comply with the requirements of the product standard and the allowable error range specified in the nutrition labeling standard at the same time.

Ø Foreign language does not correspond to Chinese
Ans: Nutrition labeling of prepackaged food should be in Chinese. If foreign language labeling is used at the same time, its content should be corresponding to Chinese, and the font size of the foreign language shall not be larger than the Chinese character number, and it is recommended to refer to GB 28050 Appendix B for the format of using foreign language at the same time.

Ø Labeling of ingredients other than Table 1 of GB 28050 and nutrient enhancers in the Nutrition Facts Table.
Ans: If you want to claim the ingredients other than Table 1 of GB 28050 and nutrient enhancers, you should indicate their added amount or content in the finished product on the label according to the requirement of quantitative labeling of GB 7718 ingredients, but should not be indicated in the table of nutrient composition.

Summary

Nutrition labeling is an important means for consumers to understand the nutritional information of food, and true and accurate labeling of nutrition labeling is the basic requirement for food companies. If related issues, welcome to communicate with us.