Pilot program of co-indication of the sell-by date and the use-by date will be implemented < Press Release < News&Welfare : Ministry of health and welfare

Pilot program of co-indication of the sell-by date and the use-by date will be implemented

Regdate2012-04-02 15:19
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Pilot program of co-indication of the sell-by date and the use-by date will be implemented

- The items for a pilot program will be selected within Apr. and the sales of them will begin in Jul. this year.

Ministry of Health and Welfare (Minister Rim, Chae Min) and Korea Food and Drug Administration (Commissioner Lee, Hee Seong) decided that they would carry out a pilot program of co-indicating the sell-by date and use-by date of processed food at the ministerial meeting on price control that was held on 29 and would begin the preparation for the pilot program from this coming Apr.

This program is a follow-up action after the “improvement plan for the indication of the expiration date for processed food” announced through the ministerial meeting on price control that was held in last Aug.

This is to prepare the foundation for rationalization of the indication of use-by dates by identifying the effect of the prevention of unnecessary food disposal and acceptance by consumers through the introduction of the sell-by date indication.

Aiming to introduce products with the sell-by date and use-by date co-indicated into the market in this Jul., and after selecting the item for a pilot program mainly from among products that have no or low safety problems* by receiving the applications from businesses that are involved in the pilot program.

Products that are to be kept at a room temperature (1~35 ℃) that show a great gap between their sell-by date and use-by date

The private and public sectors will work together to prepare the standards for setting the sell-by date upon the pilot program products, given the distribution and sales environment, etc within an extent of not causing any problem with safety by the month of June.

Along with the pilot program, the monitoring for the analysis of its effects will be carried out and the system improvement will be facilitated in earnest through the public hearing among the interested parties.

[Plan for rational improvement of the sell-by date indication for processed food]

□ Report of the plan to change the sell-by date to the use-by date for the minimization of unnecessary food disposal at the 5^th ministerial meeting on price control (18 Aug. 2011)

ㅇ (Background) There are causes for disposal and return of food that can be still eaten with the current sell-by date indication system.

- (Consumer-side) As the people mistake the “sell-by date” for the “use-by date” which indicates the date when food begins turning bad and getting rotten, the financial burden on households resulting from unnecessary disposal and purchase of food gets increased.

- (Supplier-side) The burden of disposal cost of the return, burn-away and burial of food due to a short period up to the sell-by date gets increased.

* Total loss incurred by the return of food suffered by food manufactures including the return of defective products and the stock in 2009 was around 650 billion won according to Korea Foods Industry Association.

ㅇ (What is already reported) Introduction of the use-by date and the expansion of the quality preservation period

(1) In-phase introduction of the indication of the use-by date

- (Short-term) some products have the use-by date and sell-by date indicated together while maintain the sell-by date

- (Mid- and long- term) Consider the expansion of the indication of the use-by date given the change of consumer recognition.

(2) Expansion of the indication of the best-before date

- The expansion of the indication of the best-before date which is for products whose quality merely change during the storage period and thus to which, the indication of time limit for food safety such the use-by date is not really relevant.

◇ Best Before: The date until which quality of the concerned food can be maintained when being stored under proper conditions and standards appropriate for the food.

◇ Sell by Date: The date until which the sales of the concerned product to consumers are allowed (a period from the manufacturing date)

◇ Use by Date: The date until which it is considered safe for health and safety of consumers when being eaten

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