PM Announces Changes to Canadian Food Label Laws

(CTV News)

The “made in Canada” label is about to become a lot more Canadian, Prime Minister Stephen Harper announced Wednesday.

Ottawa is introducing new laws so that food products processed in Canada, but made with foreign ingredients, will have to say so on the label, Harper told reporters in Vineland, Ont.

“The truth is, foods marked ‘product of Canada’ or ‘made in Canada’ actually may not be very Canadian at all,” he said. “Our new guidelines are designed to redefine Canadian food content labels to better reflect the true origins of products in today’s global marketplace”

Under current laws, Harper said, it’s legal to call a product “made in Canada” if 51 per cent of production costs were incurred here and the final transformation of the product was in Canada.

The current laws are largely unchanged since the 1980s — before the rapid globalization of food production changed the origin of many of the products in grocery stores.

“A bottle of apple juice could have a ‘made in Canada’ label in it and be made from apples grown in China. A bar of chocolate might say ‘product of Canada,’ but the cocoa beans could come from the Ivory Coast,’’ Harper said.

Under the new rules, a “product of Canada” label will mean that virtually all of the contents are Canadian in origin.

A consumer advocate says the changes are long overdue. Read the complete article.