MeatNews - To protect vegetarians and vegans from consuming food products containing animal products, the British Food Standards Agency has published new food- labeling guidance for manufacturers, caterers, and enforcement authorities.
(...)The guidance, drawn up after consultation with a range of stakeholders including the Vegetarian Society and the Vegan Society, will provide criteria for the use of the terms ‘vegetarian’ and ‘vegan’ on food labels for the first time.
It aims to improve consistency in the use of the terms on food labels by manufacturers and caterers and help enforcement agencies to identify misleading labeling. The guidance should also help to prevent some common mistakes by companies such as labeling beverages or food that has been derived from animal products or fish as suitable for vegetarians.
Dr. Richard Harding, head of the FSA’s Consumer Choice, Food Standards and Special Projects Division, said: “There has been a lot of confusion over the use of the terms "vegetarian" and "vegan" on food labels both in the retail and catering sectors. The root cause of the problem seems to be the lack of agreed criteria. The guidance aims to improve consistency by providing criteria for the use of these terms in food labeling.”
Tina Fox, chief executive of the Vegetarian Society, added: “We all want to know what we are eating and misleading labeling makes it particularly difficult for Britain's three million plus vegetarians and vegans to make informed choices.”
I'm torn on this.
On one hand, it would be great to go to a grocery store and not have to dig through the tiny print of the nutritional information to see if my chewing gum contains stearic acid or not. (Or, heaven forbid, vegan condoms, which apparently are not sold in the state of North Dakota...thank God for the Internet!) Plus, there are certain products where I'm just not sure, and I hate having to guess whether the lecithin in my soup came from soybeans or eggs.
However, on the other hand, I'm uncomfortable with a governmental body dictating a private business's decisions. If we're to uphold a company's right to free speech, that right surely extends to allowing them to withhold certain information about their product, or even to lie about it. Sure, I'd be really upset if I found out a company was lying to me about its use of animal products in their food....but the solution to that is not governmental intervention. The solution is the free market: If consumers were truly bothered by it, they would refuse to support the company, necessitating a change.
But then again, the free market has never been quite as popular across the pond, has it?