PRESS RELEASE
November 13, 2008
This year, the Codex Committee on Nutrition and Foods for Special Dietary Uses (CCNSFDU) took place in Cape Town, South Africa, from November 3-7, 2008, at the Southern Sun Cape Sun Hotel; and the National Health Federation (NHF) sent its voice - the only voice - for health freedom there to insert a note of reason as hundreds of bureaucrats with little, if any, love of liberty sketched out global food guidelines that will impact billions of human beings.
This Codex Committee had before it various issues that it has been tackling over the years. The main agenda items of interest to NHF were: (1) the Draft Nutritional Risk Analysis Principles and Guidelines for Application to the Work of the CCNFSDU; (2) the Proposed Draft Annex re Recommendations on the Scientific Basis of Health Claims; and (3) the Proposed Draft Additional or Revised Nutrient Reference Values for Labelling Purposes in the Codex Guidelines on Nutrition Labelling. When those issues arose for discussion by the Committee, the NHF was the most vocal International Non-Governmental Organization (INGO) to speak out on them.
Unfortunately, Chairman Rolf Grossklaus had a bee in his bonnet and did all that he could to race these agenda items to completion. In fact, once the Committee worked its way clear of the controversial Guidelines for the Use of Nutrition Claims for Dietary Fiber, which took up much of the Committee's time, it was virtually all downhill from that point on. Most of the country-member delegations were of the same mind as the Chairman and made no opposition to rapid progress.
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Agenda Item 5: Risk Analysis
The Agenda item concerning the Draft Nutritional Risk Analysis Principles and Guidelines for Application to the Work of the CCNFSDU was quickly advanced to completion by the Committee so that the Codex Alimentarius Commission (the CCNFSDU’s parent body) could adopt it at Step 8.
Along the way, however, the biggest battle was over the definitions set forth in those Guidelines, with some country delegations proposing sensible updates to the three-year-old definitions established by the FAO workshop that had established most of them. The Chairman and most of the delegations thought that the definitions were untouchable because they had come out of FAO. The NHF supported the suggestions of Canada and some others to update the definitions with sensible changes. In arguing in support of those changes, NHF delegate Scott Tips stated, "I argued that the Committee should not be bound to follow the three-year-old definitions set forth by a simple report from a technical workshop hosted by FAO. It’s not the Bible or the Koran. It should not be set in stone. When the Chairman refused to budge, it became even more evident to me than before that one of the major problems with the entire Codex process is that it will create a huge edifice of standards and guidelines based upon yesterday's news. Then, it will become, as it was at this Committee meeting, impossible to change the edifice to match advancing human knowledge. In essence, Codex will still be debating gas lighting standards while cold fusion is powering the planet. How many people will die because of outmoded standards?"
Agenda Item 6: Health Claims
Similarly, the Draft Annex re Recommendations on the Scientific Basis of Health Claims were leap-frogged ahead and approved by CCNFSDU for the Codex Commission to adopt at Step 5/8, despite the objections of Australia and the NHF that they be held over for another year and further consideration.
Over the objection of NHF, the Institute for Food Technology (IFT), Egypt, and some other delegations, the Committee removed the requirement that Codex identify "the criteria for substantiation for the different types of claims." NHF and IFT both thought it important to retain this wording in order that persons and companies submitting dossiers for approval of health claims would know what basis was being used by the regulators for accepting or rejecting health claims. Otherwise, arbitrary criteria would or could be used to thwart legitimate health claims. The European Community disagreed, so the language was removed.
Other minor modifications to the language from last year were made, but the CCNFSDU added wording made clear that "studies [supporting a claim] should be excluded from further review and not included in the relevant scientific data if they do not use appropriate measurements for the food or food constituent and health effect, have major design flaws, or are not applicable to the targeted population for a health claim."
Speaking for the NHF on another point, Scott Tips argued to the Committee that, "Any review of the available systematic data should take into account not just balanced diets but 'special diets required for a specific disease or condition.'" The Chairman agreed that that was a useful addition and the language was included until the U.S. delegate, Barbara Schneeman, objected to the language as "not appropriate." The NHF argued back that this language was even more appropriate than the "balanced diet" wording as these were for people with special needs. The Committee then puttered around considering what NHF had just said until the French delegate proposed some alternate, weaker language that was ultimately accepted and saved some semblance of what NHF had proposed. But once again Dr. Schneeman had worked against American interests because she had forgotten that U.S. law itself uses the wording proposed by the NHF!
Agenda Item 7: NRVs
There was some discussion among the Committee members about Proposed Draft Additional or Revised Nutrient Reference Values for Labelling Purposes in the Codex Guidelines on Nutrition Labelling. In the end, however, not much was accomplished and the Committee agreed to return the General Principles for Establishing NRVs of Vitamins and Minerals for General Population back to Step 2/3 for redrafting by an Electronic Working Group.
The
meeting ended on Friday, the 7th, with the reading of the draft Report.
Next year’s CCNFSDU meeting will take place in Germany during the first week of
November. The actual location in Germany was not announced.
For further information on Codex , please visit the NHF website (Codex):
http://www.thenhf.com/codex.
NHF Codex Overview (May be used as an article or printed as a handout to educate on Codex)
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Click here for the permanent link to this press release, use this link to inform others.
National Health Federation: Established in 1955, the National Health Federation is a consumer-education, health-freedom organization working to protect individuals' rights to choose to consume healthy food, take supplements and use alternative therapies without unnecessary government restrictions. The NHF is the only such organization with recognized observer-delegate status at Codex meetings. www.thenhf.com
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