During November 2018, FDA issued two new guidance documents — one final and one draft — to support the nutrition labeling final rules issued in 2016.
Most companies must comply with the new final rules by January, 1, 2020. Companies with less than ten million dollars in annual food sales have an extra year to comply, with all inventory phased in by January 1, 2021. Despite these absolute compliance dates, many manufacturers have chosen to phase in their inventory sooner to have current and contemporary labels.
The new final guidance relates to compliance dates, added sugars and declaring quantitative amounts of vitamins and minerals, replacing the draft guidance from January 2017. Even though FDA received over 1,600 comments regarding the draft guidance, its essence didn't change dramatically. The guidance includes expanded information about calculating added sugars from concentrated juices, as well as a revised table for vitamin and mineral rounding rules.
The new draft guidance relates to single serving containers and dual column labeling for packages that contain at least 200% and up to and including 300% of reference amounts customarily consumed, in addition to other topics of interest to food labelers. Comments on the draft guidance are due to FDA by January 4, 2019.
The guidance documents are available here:
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